How Cherry Creek Public Schools Builds a Sustainable Funding Pathway for a Comprehensive Mental Health Program

• The superintendent believed that to achieve the school’s mission of each student finding a pathway to a fulfilling future, (their “Pathway of Purpose”), students must first have their fundamental needs met, including mental health. This ethos acted as a north star.
• The district assessed student needs and mapped existing resources in the district and community. The mental health task force, discussed above, was key to this process.
• The Chief Health Officer collected qualitative and quantitative data to make her case to district leadership. Throughout this process, she engaged the chief financial officer, who was instrumental in reallocating funds in the budget to enable expanded mental health programming.

• In 2021, the district combined its physical and mental health services divisions to create the Office of Student Health, which focuses on supporting students and educators’ mental, physical, emotional, and social needs. Combining health and mental health under one umbrella not only helped them better serve students, but facilitated grant applications, collaboration, and pooled funding.
• Cherry Creek enrolled in the Medicaid School Health Services program to recoup funds for Medicaid-covered services delivered in the school setting. It invested in hiring a couple of administrative staff members to do the work required to realize the full extent of this reimbursement. While this required initial investment, the funds generated through Medicaid cover administrative staff time while also providing a more sustainable funding source for mental health supports.
• The district built up their grant team from one person to three people so they could increase their capacity to apply for grants.
• The district used a Request for Proposal (RFP) process that included a team of eight to nine district staff who made sure the companies chosen could provide customizable services that fit with the district’s culture and that each company chosen was well-established and sustainable. Additionally, district administrators negotiated contracts to make sure that they met their students' needs and fit within their budget.

Cherry Creek pulled together a number of funding sources to support its mental health programming. Some of these included:

• Reallocation of existing funding streams to prioritize mental health initiatives. For instance, the district focused more on mental health during the pandemic when youth nationwide were experiencing heightened mental health concerns. The district aligned various funding sources for prevention and mental health purposes that were previously allocated to other programs.
• Cherry Creek’s participation in the Medicaid School Health Services program allowed it to claim for Medicaid-covered services it was already providing and created a new and sustainable funding stream that enabled them to contract with Hazel Health.
• The district was successful in obtaining various federal, state, and philanthropic grants to support specific components of its mental health programming. For example, they received a federal grant to hire substance use counselors for each middle school.
• The district used money from a bond measure approved by voters in 2020 to build a school-based day treatment center, Traverse Academy. This first-in-the-nation treatment center was also enabled by the vision of the district Board of Education and staff leaders in partnership with the University of Colorado Psychiatry Department and Children’s Hospital.
• Supported largely through community donations, The Cherry Creek Schools Foundation established the Cherry Creek Schools Mental Health Relief Fund which provided funds for mental health services and directly assisted students and families accessing these services.