WELLNESS CENTER
Creating a wellness complex that will house a comprehensive school-based mental health program.
According to the Surgeon General of the United States, we are in the midst of a youth mental health crisis. According to the Center for Disease Control, in the 10 years leading up to the pandemic, feelings of persistent sadness and hopelessness— as well as suicidal thoughts and behaviors—increased by about 40% among young people. At San Marcos, our internal data tells us 33% of students feel worried frequently or almost always, and about a quarter felt frequently or almost always sad and/or angry. In response to this crisis, our school and district have worked hard to provide supports. San Marcos currently has a licensed social worker, contracts with Family Services Agency (FSA) for 2.5 therapists, has eight counselors, access to one Youth Outreach Worker, and one Health Technician, in addition to having agreements in place with Hospice, CADA, Freedom for Youth, Alternatives to Violence Project, and other community based organizations. While these offerings are more robust than 10 years ago, it’s not enough to handle all the needs of a school of 200 students, especially as budget pressures continue to influence what we can provide.
“I’m deeply concerned as a parent and as a doctor that the obstacles this generation of young people face are unprecedented and uniquely hard to navigate and the impact that’s having on their mental health is devastating. Our obligation to act is not just medical, it’s moral. It’s not only about saving lives, it’s about listening to our kids who are concerned about the state of the world that they are set to inherit. It’s about our opportunity to rebuild a world that we want to give them, a world that fundamentally refocuses our priorities on people and community and builds a culture of kindness, inclusion and respect.”
— U.S. SURGEON GENERAL DR. VIVEK MURTHY
speaking to the U.S. Senate on February 8, 2022.
ACCORDING TO DATA, a local healthcare worker will stay working in the Cottage Health Care system for an average of 25 years, while a non-local person will remain for an average of five years. (from the Cottage Health Community Needs Assessment Report, 2019)
This project will allow us to build an even more robust program, with new pathways in areas such as mental health and healthcare administration, by creating a new campus for the HCA with an updated, customized, centralized facility. This new building will not only provide our students with more opportunities to build lives in our local area, but also help address the dearth of qualified applicants for our local health provider organizations. Perhaps most importantly, Our new mental health pathway will allow us to leverage our new Wellness Center to both train up future leaders in the field and allow us to creatively approach the ongoing mental health crisis amongst our youth. As part of the reimagining of the HCA we have already convened an advisory panel consisting of many of the top leaders in the local health care field, and have partnered with Cottage Hospital and the Mosher Foundation to create and fund a full time HCA Coordinator to develop our new pathways, create new curriculum, and build the profoundly transformative program we envision.
Alumni Statistics
422 students have graduated from the Health Careers Academy.
214 of them graduated as Certified Nursing Assistants.
23 students have been hired at Cottage Health Systems.
52 students have been hired in other health care settings both in and outside of our community.
The demographics of the HCA mirror that of San Marcos High School. The HCA is open to all students.
This flagship Career Technical Education pathway prepares students to enter the medical field. The program helps students become highly competitive when applying to health career focused colleges and universities. If students choose to complete a Certificated Nursing Assistant credentialing program while in the HCA pathway, they are also qualified to enter the workforce immediately after high school.
WELLNESS CENTER RENDERINGS
