SCHOOL NURSES: Best Practices for Proactive Behavioral Health Services Presented by Wendy Niskanen, MEd, RN Outstanding School Nurse and Presenter

Specifically Designed for School Nurses, District Nurses and School Health Services Coordinators Serving Students in Grades K-12

Practical Ideas and Strategies

If you are looking for the most up-to-date practices to better support the behavioral health of your students, this is a seminar you won't want to miss! During this intensive seminar, outstanding school nurse and experienced nurse educator Wendy Niskanen will share dozens of the most up-to-date practices, evidence-based strategies and practical tips to help school nurses better support student behavioral health in the school setting. As an experienced school nurse, Wendy knows firsthand the seriousness of the daily behavioral health challenges in schools today. Your ever-changing role as a school nurse will be viewed from the perspective of how you can best support students' behavioral health and remove barriers to learning in your school setting. Gain greater confidence in your practice and discover new and innovative strategies that will make your daily interventions more effective.

You will leave this seminar renewed professionally, equipped with proven strategies and resources to better support the behavioral health of your students and yourself. The evidence-based strategies and tools you'll gain will give you the increased knowledge and confidence you need to proactively support the behavioral health needs in your schools.

Ten Key Benefits of Attending

1. Support Students' Behavioral Well-Being and Provide Trauma Responsive Care
   Discover how to promote trauma sensitivity in your school's culture and make your health room space more conducive to supporting behavioral health and wellness
2. Increase Your Understanding of the Impact of Trauma and Chronic Stress on Brain Development and Behavior
   Increase your understanding of Adverse Childhood Experiences and their physiological impacts on brain development that result in behavioral health challenges, including sensory issues and emotional dysregulation
3. Address the Interrelatedness Between Chronic Medical Conditions and Behavioral Health
   Learn to recognize the behavioral health impacts of medical conditions such as
   diabetes … Understand how to effectively manage chronic conditions impacted by stress, such as asthma, autoimmune disorders, and POTS … Learn how to support students with eating disorders and psychogenic non-epileptic seizures
4. Understand the Role Social Determinants Play in Behavioral Health
   Examine social determinants of health, including poverty, and their impact on both the risk for poor behavioral health outcomes and inequity in access to services
5. More Effectively Manage Somatic Physiological Manifestations of Behavioral Health Concerns
   Understand how migraine, irritable bowel syndrome (stomachache, nausea and diarrhea), cyclical vomiting syndrome, chronic pain, and many other somatic concerns relate to anxiety, depression, school stress, and trauma and are often the cause of repeated health room visits and chronic absenteeism
6. Update Your Understanding of the Pharmacological Supports for Behavioral Health in the School Setting
   Get the most up-to-date information on the recommended uses and side effects of the most common behavioral health medications seen in schools … Learn how to better support families as they navigate a complex behavioral health system
7. Build Resilience and Behavioral Skills for Your Students
   Integrate evidence-base strategies into your practice for that build students' social-emotional skills and resilience
8. Recognize the Essential Role of the School Nurse in Advocating for Behavioral Health Supports in the Classroom
   Help students overcome barriers to behavioral health by exploring appropriate accommodations for 504, IEP and behavioral health plans, including addressing the return to school after hospitalization for an acute mental health episode
9. Build a More Collaborative Relationship with Your integrated School Health Team
   Behavioral health is not only the domain of school counselors, social workers and psychologists … Increase the effectiveness of partnerships between the school nurse and other behavioral health providers in and outside the school setting
10. Receive a Comprehensive Behavioral Health Digital Resource Handbook
    You'll receive a comprehensive behavioral health digital resource handbook packed with dozens of resources designed specifically for school nurses

Outstanding Strategies You Can Use Immediately

• Proven strategies and practices to better support students' behavioral health
• The significant impact of trauma on behavioral health and proactive strategies for addressing it in the school setting
• Proven strategies to help students manage medical conditions which can be exacerbated by stress
• Ways to more effectively recognize and manage somatic conditions of students in the school setting
• How school nurses can address the impact of chronic medical conditions on students' behavioral health
• The most-up-to-date information on the side effects and risks of common behavioral health medications
• Proven strategies for better supporting families in navigating the behavioral health system
• How chronic stress impacts cognitive development and student learning
• Effective strategies for building more collaborative partnerships with behavioral health providers in schools and the community
• How to support students' wellness using mindfulness, gentle movement, breathing exercises, and guided meditations for self-care
• Targeted strengths-based supports for students who grapple with personal trauma, substance abuse, addiction and those who self-identify in the LBGTQ+ population
• Effective accommodations that support students with behavioral health challenges in the classroom

A Message From Your Seminar Leader

Dear Colleague:

As a fellow school nurse, I recognize the unique rewards and challenges of our nursing specialty. We cherish those moments when we connect with a student or family in a way that makes their experience with school and life more positive, and yet we often cannot prioritize behavioral health until it becomes an emergency. Most often, our care management is focused on the day-to-day management of chronic physical conditions, and we do not have the bandwidth to develop the behavioral health aspect of our practices.

Students with behavioral health issues come to the health room, often repeatedly, with somatic complaints that arise from anxiety, depression, school stress, and trauma, and we are uniquely positioned to support their behavioral health journey. I invite you to join me in this seminar as we explore the multiple ways we can better support our students, helping them overcome behavioral health barriers to their education and develop skills that will keep them well for a lifetime.

Beyond somatic concerns, understanding the interrelatedness between chronic health conditions and behavioral health is essential for effective case management. Recognizing the deleterious impact of medical conditions on behavioral health and understanding the exacerbating impact of chronic stress on chronic physical conditions can dramatically improve delivery of care. For example, understanding links between diabetes and depression risk, and understanding links between adverse experiences and conditions such as asthma and immune disorders, can increase ability to identify needs and implement effective interventions. In addition, learning about the management of eating disorders and psychogenetic, non-epileptic seizures (PNES) in the school setting can improve management of those conditions.

Mental health first aid is essential, but it is not enough. School nurses have the opportunity to proactively address students' behavioral health. My goal is that after attending this seminar, you will have the knowledge to:

• Identify the key factors that impact students' behavioral health
• Build stronger partnerships among school, families and providers to address concerns and implement behavioral health plans of care
• More effectively manage the somatic physical impacts of behavioral health
• Understand the interrelatedness between chronic health conditions and behavioral health
• Help students develop the resilience and skills needed to engage successfully in school
• Remove behavioral health barriers to learning through your roles on 504, IEP and behavior teams

I look forward to exploring these topics with you in this engaging, collaborative seminar.

Sincerely,
Wendy Niskanen, MEd, RN

P.S. I know how valuable your time is, so I will focus on the most useful strategies to support your practice. You will receive a comprehensive behavioral health digital resource handbook containing a summary of all the information and resources presented in this seminar to support your practice moving forward.

Who Should Attend

School Nurses, District Nurses and School Health Services Coordinators Serving Students in Grades K-12

Special Benefits of Attending

Extensive Resource Handbook
You will receive an extensive digital resource handbook specifically designed for this seminar. The handbook includes:

• Best practices and evidence-based strategies for proactively supporting behavioral health in the school setting
• Valuable behavioral health resources including websites, references, and organizations
• The most-up-to-date recommendations on pharmacological supports for behavioral health in the school setting

For in-person seminars, registrants will also receive a printed copy of the resource handbook as long as their registration is received in the BER office at least 15 calendar days before the event.

Meet and Share
This seminar provides a wonderful opportunity for participants to share ideas with other school nurses interested in enhancing their practice.

Consultation Available
Wendy Niskanen will be available for consultation regarding your questions and the unique needs of your own nursing program.

Earn Nursing CEUs
Provider approved by the California Board of Registered Nursing, Provider #CEP 15144, for five (5) Contact Hours for RNs and LPNs. For specific details, visit www.ber.org/nursing-ceus.

On-Site Training Guarantee

BER is not a booking agency that just finds a presenter who presents on the topic you requested. Rather, we only recommend highly experienced BER presenters who have consistently received outstanding evaluations from educators attending their trainings.

Consequently, we provide a strong program guarantee.

We guarantee you'll be fully satisfied or you'll owe us nothing after your on-site training event.