Wellbeing Matters

Enhancing Mental Health Support in Schools (EMHSS) Program

We have some great news - Beaumaris Secondary College will continue to have a Headspace clinician supporting our students mental health needs in 2024. 

Andrew Ryan from Headspace Syndal will be commence fortnightly for one day a week on Thursday 15th February 2024.  Andrew will work with our wellbeing team to provide wellbeing support to students whilst at school. Beaumaris Secondary College students will be able to access up to 6 sessions within the Enhanced Mental Health Support in Schools (EMHSS) program without the need for a GP Mental Health Care Plan. To support school communities to effectively identify and intervene in the mental health needs of children and young people, the Victorian Government announced the Victorian Anti-Bullying and Mental Health Initiative in early 2018 to set up the EMHSS program for all 327 Victorian Government secondary schools. 

The purpose of the EMHSS initiative is to provide enhanced mental health services to young people in Victorian government secondary schools to deliver one on one student counselling sessions. Through this initiative, secondary students have easier access to mental counselling services offered by Headspace. Students can access counselling services via a referral made through wellbeing within the school.   

To be eligible for this service, consent needs to be obtained and students must:

• Be enrolled at a Victorian government secondary school at the time of referral.

• Be identified as experiencing mild to moderate mental health issues.

A bit about Andrew: 

Hi my name is Andrew Ryan, I am a mental health occupational therapist who has been working for headspace for over 7 years. I was previously working in Bendigo before moving to Melbourne with my partner at the end of 2022. I have always had a strong interest in youth mental health and outside of working my interest are AFL (Richmond) and collecting records. I look forward to coming out to Beaumaris in 2024.

eSafety Parent and Carer Webinars

Community Mentors for Students

We often get asked within the Wellbeing Team about community mentors for students and ‘A Path to Follow’ is a local organisation which has just that. Read more here.

Ms Dilek Yucel (Psychologist, Head of Wellbeing), Ms Rachel Felmingham (Mental Health Practitioner), Mr Elin Kim (Counsellor) and Bali (Therapy Dog)