Children to be taught to show some ‘grit'

Telegraph

15-05-2025

Children will be taught the value of 'grit' to tackle a growing mental health crisis in schools, The Telegraph can reveal.
Writing below, Bridget Phillipson, the Education Secretary, and Wes Streeting, the Health Secretary, say that children need to be prepared for life's 'ups and downs' in the classroom.
Deteriorating mental health is driving record school absences, Department for Education data published last week showed, with the knock-on effects having an influence on pupils through to adulthood.
Under the government drive to improve mental health in schools, children will be offered sessions to 'tackle anxiety and low mood', with struggling schools receiving extra support through 'attendance and behaviour hubs'.
The classroom interventions mark Labour's latest effort to crack down on worklessness, which in part has been fuelled by a surge in mental health problems since the pandemic.
Ms Phillipson and Mr Streeting say: 'By deploying NHS-led, evidence-based intervention during children's formative years, we will not only halt the spiral towards crisis but cultivate much-needed grit amongst the next generation – essential for academic success and life beyond school, with all its ups and downs.'
More than a fifth of eight to 16-year-olds had a probable mental health problem in 2023, according to the latest NHS data, an increase of seven percentage points since 2017.
Poor mental health has been blamed for school absence levels, which remain near pandemic highs five years on, with more than 20 per cent of children missing at least one day each fortnight last term.
'The worse your mental health, the worse your school attendance and vice versa,' say Ms Phillipson and Mr Streeting, adding that the Government will not sit back and 'dismiss the issue as something that children will grow out of'.
The Education and Health Secretaries cite recent government research showing missed school days harmed future career prospects, with frequently absent pupils earning £10,000 less aged 28 compared with their peers with clean attendance records.
They also say that helping children while they are at school will help break the 'doom loop' of unaddressed mental health problems that end up costing the NHS millions.
Mental health or behavioural conditions now account for almost 45 per cent of disability claims from working-age people.
Sir Keir Starmer has promised to clamp down on benefits claims for minor mental health problems in an attempt to reduce the welfare bill and worklessness crisis plaguing the country.
Mr Streeting has also been tackling worklessness, saying earlier this year that people on benefits who want to work must be supported to return to employment.
He also warned against the 'overdiagnosis' of mental health problems, calling it a 'spectrum' and saying that too many people were being 'written off'.
Ministers are also concerned about worsening behaviour problems among children, amid record suspension levels.
Teachers in England handed out almost 295,600 suspensions in the spring term of 2023-24, compared with around 263,900 during the same term the year before.
Experts have warned that is likely a hangover from disrupted social norms during the pandemic, when children were made to stay at home while schools were shuttered during repeated lockdowns.
Under the new measures, the number of specialist mental health support teams will rise from 607 to 713 by March 2026, which will help provide one-on-one support to pupils 'who need it but don't need an NHS referral threshold'.
The Government will also recruit new attendance and behaviour ambassadors to 'prevent greater problems mounting up down the line'.
Ms Phillipson and Mr Streeting say the measures will tackle the 'triple threat of attendance, behaviour and mental health' and 'supercharge a co-ordinated effort to address the root causes of issues causing disruption and chaos in classrooms'.
'Early interventions in mental health support for young people can have positive ramifications for the rest of their lives,' they say.
We will intervene early to help struggling children
By Bridget Philipson and Wes Streeting
A lot has changed since we left school more than 20 years ago.
Children today, who have been brought up in an increasingly digitised 21st century, are facing new and complex challenges in their childhoods that simply didn't exist when we were younger. Negotiating your school days in the face of this is having a serious impact on some children's mental health.
It's a problem that has been getting worse in recent years. Around 20 per cent of young people experience some type of mental health issue in any given year, up from 14 per cent in 2017.
And this is just the tip of the iceberg – there are likely to be many thousands more struggling with their wellbeing who don't meet the threshold for a clinical diagnosis.
Much as it might be tempting to dismiss the issue as something that children will grow out of, the evidence tells a different story.
New research published by the Government last week proved the direct, escalating impact that poor mental health has on children's school attendance. The worse your mental health, the worse your school attendance and vice versa.
These aren't small effects either. A little absence quickly accumulates devastating impact: pupils missing merely 10 days more than peers have half the odds of achieving good GCSEs. They earn £10,000 less at age 28 on average, compared to pupils with near-perfect attendance.
Early interventions in mental health support for young people can have positive ramifications for the rest of their lives. The same is true in lots of different areas of public policy. This Government is embarked on a public service reform agenda focused on intervening early to prevent greater problems mounting up down the line.
We know this approach delivers better outcomes for patients and pupils, and better value for taxpayers. It is the key to breaking out of the doom loop where the costs of public services continually rise, while the quality of services declines.
As Education Secretary and Health and Social Care Secretary, we are also taking action to improve the mental health of the country's children.
We will deliver on our manifesto commitment to get every child who needs it access to mental health support within school – and over the course of this year we will roll that support out to nearly a million extra children. Supporting teachers to identify which children need support. Running group sessions to tackle anxiety and low mood. One-to-one support for those who need it but don't meet an NHS referral threshold.
By deploying NHS-led, evidence-based intervention during children's formative years, we will not only halt the spiral towards crisis but cultivate much-needed grit amongst the next generation – essential for academic success and life beyond school, with all its ups and downs.
Already on the school attendance front, we are seeing encouraging signs in the months this Government has been in office. Children have clocked up 3.1 million more days in the classroom this year compared with last year.
But it is from now that we will see a real step change, as we really start to tackle the triple threat of attendance, behaviour and mental health in a joined-up way.
We are following proven methods that work. Led by data and guided by best practice. We are launching innovative new attendance and behaviour hubs, led by the highest-performing schools in the country, that alongside the mental health support teams, will drive the highest standards in how schools get more children in the classroom, engaged in learning.
Once at scale, the hubs will provide intensive one-to-one help and advice to 500 schools with significant attendance and behaviour problems, challenging and supporting them to turn this around. A further 4,500 more schools will get support through practical resources and training days.
Today we supercharge a co-ordinated effort to address the root causes of issues resulting in disruption and chaos in classrooms.
Through our Plan for Change, this Government will give every child the chance to thrive in classrooms where brilliant teachers have the time, tools and support to deliver an outstanding education.