Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Education Secretary Linda McMahon generally sit next to each other during President Trump’s cabinet meetings, as at this one on Aug. 26.
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U.S. Health Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr and Education Secretary Linda McMahon want schools to do away with mental health screenings and therapy. Instead, they argue in a Washington Post opinion piece that schools “must return to the natural sources of mental well-being: strong families, nutrition and fitness, and hope for the future.”
In the op-ed, the two secretaries mention a recent bill signed by Illinois Governor JB Pritzker, which requires all schools in the state to offer mental health screening tests, starting with third graders. The screenings are standardized questionnaires that ask children about their feelings and well-being.
Kennedy and McMahon posit that such screens “medicalize the unique and sometimes unpredictable behavior of young children,” creating “new stigmas that students might carry with them for life. We must make American children healthy again without treating them all like patients.”
NPR spoke to mental health experts who say the op-ed is misleading about school-based mental health screenings and therapy. Here are three points they say are important to know about the issue.
1. Mental health screenings reduce stigma, rather than create it.Â
Mental health screenings open up a conversation about mental health.
“They are awareness and…