Development and Evaluation of a Pilot Short-Term Mental Health Curriculum with Longitudinal Evaluation for Minority Youth

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5195/ijms.2025.2805

Keywords:

Mental Health, Curriculum, Adolescent, Health Education, Minority Groups, Ethnic Groups, Community-Academic Partnerships, Early Intervention, Educational, Psychological Resilience, Social Support, , Psychologic stress, Emotion Regulation, Interpersonal Relations, Needs Assessment

Abstract

Background: Minority youth are susceptible to mental health issues in the United States. Early intervention with a mental health curriculum is valuable in building resilience and wellness. Our study’s purpose was to design, implement and evaluate a mental health curriculum (Mental Health Matters) for minority youth in a local community center.

Methods: We conducted a needs assessment of mental health topics important for minority youth. Pre-and post-lesson surveys were administered at each session to measure students’ knowledge and understanding of lesson objectives. We analyzed paired data using a Wilcoxon signed-rank test.

Results: The needs assessment identified a need for educating youth about emotional insight and regulation and interpersonal communication. From the needs assessment, we worked with a local community organization to design a short-term longitudinal mental health curriculum. With the same local community organization, we implemented the curriculum to an after-school program for minority youth. The pre- and post-survey showed the students gained a significant increase of perceived confidence: fundamentals of mental health (p=0.008); stress response, box breathing, and perceiving stress (p=0.046); coping skills (p=0.025); communication styles/conflict resolution strategies (p=0.031). Qualitative feedback from students and administrators indicated strengths of the curriculum included its adaptability and applicability to students’ lives.

Conclusion: Overall, we successfully developed a pilot mental health curriculum based on a community needs assessment for minority youth.

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References

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Box plot comparing confidence levels before and after Lesson 1. The graph shows a significant increase in self-reported confidence from pre-lesson to post-lesson, with a p-value less than 0.01, indicating statistical significance.

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Published

2025-03-31

How to Cite

Granberry, R., Mathesh, V., Ford, L., Thompson, W., Loria, H., & Pak, T. K. (2025). Development and Evaluation of a Pilot Short-Term Mental Health Curriculum with Longitudinal Evaluation for Minority Youth . International Journal of Medical Students, 13(1), 67–72. https://doi.org/10.5195/ijms.2025.2805

Issue

Vol. 13 No. 1 (2025)

Section

Short Communication

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Copyright (c) 2025 Robin C. Granberry, Vivek Mathesh, Lauren Ford, Wesley Thompson, Hilda Loria, Thomas Pak

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