The Future of Mentally Healthy Classrooms: Celebrating our partnership with Place2Be
Last week Moray House and Place2Be hosted an event to celebrate a successful five-year partnership and build awareness of the work supporting student teachers.
Since 2018, Place2Be and Moray House School of Education and Sport have proudly worked together to help strengthen student teachers’ understanding, skills and knowledge around children’s mental health and emotional resilience.
The partnership was the first of its kind in Initial Teacher Education (ITE) in Scotland, integrating a Place2Be clinician within Moray House. This clinician, Dr Kathleen Forbes, provides expertise and also:
builds capacity across ITE programmes in the area of mental health and wellbeing
works to increase student teachers’ knowledge and understanding of children’s mental health.
To celebrate this successful partnership, and build awareness of the Place2Be and the ITE model, we hosted a joint event to bring together key people from across the education and mental health sector. During the event, attendees heard from:
Jenny Gilruth MSP, Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills
Professor David Smith, Head of School, Moray House School of Education and Sport
Dr Sam Fawkner, Deputy Head of Moray House School of Education and Sport
Dr Niki Cooper, Clinical Director, Place2Be
Dr Kathleen Forbes, Place2Be Clinician based within Moray House School of Education and Sport
Dr Tracy Stewart, Lecturer in Developmental Psychology and Clinical Psychologist
Dr Zoe Roberston, Head of the Institute of Education, Teaching and Leadership
Catherine Henderson, Place2Be Business Development Consultant
Alumni, Students of MHSES
I was heartened to hear the difference Place2Be has made for student teachers. I think we need to see more of this in terms of how we support Initial Teacher Education and there will undoubtedly be lessons we can learn, across government, from the longitudinal research on this work that has been proposed.
The event also provided an opportunity to announce joint research ambitions, building an evidence base around the long term impact of the model as students enter the early phase of their teaching career.
We need a conversation nationally about where we go next and how we build on these successes to create both the mentally healthy classrooms in which we want all Scottish learners to flourish - as well as a sustainable workforce to inspire, guide, and teach them.
This partnership ultimately leads to teachers who have greater emotional regulation, better self-awareness and increased resilience. They will be able to create classrooms in which children feel safe, emotionally secure, and understood by their teacher.
As we strive to address the mental health of our children it
has never been more important to continue to create nurturing educational environments. It is imperative to acknowledge and address the emotional well-being of our teachers, ensuring that they are equipped and supported to guide our future generations. The success of this partnership is not just in its immediate outcomes but in the ripple effect it creates—a wave of emotionally resilient and equipped teachers shaping the future of our society.
