{"id":{"repo_id":"uwo","oai_identifier":"oai:uwo.scholaris.ca:20.500.14721/26405"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/uwo/oai:uwo.scholaris.ca:20.500.14721/26405","repository":{"repo_id":"uwo","name":"Western University","base_url":"https://uwo.scholaris.ca/server/oai/request"},"display":{"title":"Transforming School-Based Mental Health to Heal the Collective Soul Wound","abstract":"Pervasive well-being concerns of youth in Alberta are steadily contributing to society’s collective soul wound. In response to this growing need, K-12 systems are faced with increased demands for school-based mental health services. Public Prairie School Division (PPSD) provides student mental health intervention needs through onsite access to school-based teacher counsellors and referrals to centralized psychologists. However, decisions regarding mental health practitioner allocations or practice standards are often left to individuals and generally follow historical practice. This Organizational Improvement Plan (OIP) problematizes PPSD’s lack of system-wide approaches to mental health interventions that can provide assurance of improved efficacy and equity in meeting student mental health needs. Transformative leadership applied within a utilitarian consequentialist lens has the potential to improve individual and collective student well-being. The decolonizing lens of scarring the collective soul wound will elevate system leadership to counter pervasive neoliberalism and allow for change and healing within ethical spaces. Actioning psychosocial change using transformative learning theory positions practitioners as co-creators of new counselling practice standards in response to student and parent feedback. Allocation changes stemming from systemic analysis of demographic and referral data should increase equity of access to teacher counsellors. Evidence of improved access and efficacy in mental health interventions will be sought through interconnected plan-do-study-act cycles and more broadly confirmed through a RE-AIM framework. Verifying PPSD’s collective soul wound scar also requires the application of an Indigenous wellness perspective.","abstract_html":"Pervasive well-being concerns of youth in Alberta are steadily contributing to society’s collective soul wound. In response to this growing need, K-12 systems are faced with increased demands for school-based mental health services. Public Prairie School Division (PPSD) provides student mental health intervention needs through onsite access to school-based teacher counsellors and referrals to centralized psychologists. However, decisions regarding mental health practitioner allocations or practice standards are often left to individuals and generally follow historical practice. This Organizational Improvement Plan (OIP) problematizes PPSD’s lack of system-wide approaches to mental health interventions that can provide assurance of improved efficacy and equity in meeting student mental health needs. Transformative leadership applied within a utilitarian consequentialist lens has the potential to improve individual and collective student well-being. The decolonizing lens of scarring the collective soul wound will elevate system leadership to counter pervasive neoliberalism and allow for change and healing within ethical spaces. Actioning psychosocial change using transformative learning theory positions practitioners as co-creators of new counselling practice standards in response to student and parent feedback. Allocation changes stemming from systemic analysis of demographic and referral data should increase equity of access to teacher counsellors. Evidence of improved access and efficacy in mental health interventions will be sought through interconnected plan-do-study-act cycles and more broadly confirmed through a RE-AIM framework. Verifying PPSD’s collective soul wound scar also requires the application of an Indigenous wellness perspective.","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Holowka, Andrea L"],"institution":null,"degree_name":"Doctor of Education","degree_level":null,"degree_discipline":"Education","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":[],"advisors":["Lowrey, Scott","Keith, Erin"],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2023,"date_issued":"2023-07-18","date_published":"2023-07-18","updated_at":"2026-07-27T21:56:11Z","subjects":["K-12 schools","school-based mental health","transformative leadership","system leadership","psychosocial change","decolonizing lens"],"languages":["en_ca"],"rights":[],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14721/26405","outbound_label":"Handle","outbound_source":"dc:identifier.uri"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor.advisor","label":"Advisor","values":["Lowrey, Scott","Keith, Erin"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Holowka, Andrea L"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date.accessioned","label":"Dc Date Accessioned","values":["2025-06-30T18:46:49Z"]},{"key":"dc:date.available","label":"Dc Date Available","values":["2025-06-30T18:46:49Z"]},{"key":"dc:date.issued","label":"Date","values":["2023-07-18"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["Education"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["Doctor of Education"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["K-12 schools","school-based mental health","transformative leadership","system leadership","psychosocial change","decolonizing lens"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language.iso","label":"Language (ISO)","values":["en_ca"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier.uri","label":"Identifier URI","values":["https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14721/26405"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description","label":"Description","values":["The thesis cover page in the PDF document includes references to Western University’s previous institutional repository platform, known as Scholarship@Western, and links to that platform (beginning with ir.lib.uwo.ca). In citing or referring to this thesis, use the DOI or handle from this page instead. Sample citation: Author name, \"Thesis title.\" (Year). Western University Open Repository. https://doi.org/10.71858/123456."]},{"key":"dc:description.abstract","label":"Abstract","values":["Pervasive well-being concerns of youth in Alberta are steadily contributing to society’s collective soul wound. In response to this growing need, K-12 systems are faced with increased demands for school-based mental health services. Public Prairie School Division (PPSD) provides student mental health intervention needs through onsite access to school-based teacher counsellors and referrals to centralized psychologists. However, decisions regarding mental health practitioner allocations or practice standards are often left to individuals and generally follow historical practice. 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