Letter: Mental health test makes good sense

Sunday, Aug. 13, 2006 | 7:32 a.m.

I am responding to the well-written Aug. 7 article by Emily Richmond, "Should schools be testing student's mental health?":

My response is yes, yes, yes to administer the Columbia TeenScreen questionnaire as a tool to evaluate an adolescent's mental health.

I applaud Gary Waters, a member of the state Board of Education, for his efforts to bring voluntary mental health screening to Clark County high schools. It also would be advantageous to have some sort of emotional screening in elementary grades.

If a child has a problem, parents are provided with a list of social services that offer counseling and clinical intervention. All information is confidential.

The high school classes are too large for the teacher to be able to identify all children with emotional problems. There are children who slip through the cracks and go unnoticed because they are quite withdrawn. There is the child who has no friends and goes unnoticed. The quicker that emotional problems are found, the quicker the child can get help.

There are so many visible problems in which children should have been helped. Remember the Columbine High School massacre in Colorado? That might have been prevented if the boys who did the terrible shootings had been identified with emotional problems and given help.

I applaud Gary Waters' efforts to bring voluntary health screenings to the Clark County High School. It is modern, up-to-date common sense to have this program.

Lenette Rabinowitz, Las Vegas