Innovations in Practice: 'Go-to' Educator Training on the mental health competencies of educators in the secondary school setting: A program evaluation

Educators can play an important role in early identification and triage of youth with mental disorders. This paper reports findings of a program evaluation of the 'Go-To' Educator Training in a secondary school setting. Methods: Pre- and posttests were administered. Results: Participant mean scores on mental health competencies changed from 12 (40%) (standard deviation [SD] = 4.3) pretraining to 21 (70%) (SD = 3.3) posttraining, t(119) = 25.6, p < .0001, d = 2.3. Participant attitude mean scores improved from 49.9 (SD = 4.6) pretraining, to 51.5 (SD = 4.2), t(115) = 4.3, p < .0001, d = 0.36. Conclusions: This training is a useful intervention to help educators identify youth with mental disorders and link them to appropriate services.