Children’s mental health charity, Place2Be, has been providing in-school support and expert training to improve the emotional wellbeing of pupils, families, teachers and school staff in Scottish primary and secondary schools since 2001.
Starting with an initial pilot in two Edinburgh primary schools, Place2Be Scotland now reaches over 14,000 pupils and their families in schools across Glasgow, Edinburgh, South Lanarkshire, Renfrewshire, Dundee, Angus, Perth and Kinross and South Ayrshire. Our training programme includes a Mental Health Champions Foundation Course available free of charge to 50,000 teachers across the UK and support for School Leaders.
As an established leader in the field Place2Be has also been commissioned by the Scottish Government to deliver a nationwide support service for school leaders, teachers and staff across Scotland. In addition we are working in partnership with the University of Edinburgh to support teachers of the future to develop their resilience, understand children’s mental health and wellbeing and contribute to mental healthy schools.
We are committed to supporting the social, emotional and mental wellbeing of children and young people in the crucial formative years of their lives. Our expert teams provide pupils and their families with emotional and therapeutic support, as well as delivering training within school communities. All of our work is evidence-based, using tried and tested methods, backed by research.
Place2Be’s mental health practitioners currently work directly within over 40 school communities - supporting school leaders, school staff, children, young people and their families in some of Scotland’s most deprived communities.
We build children and young people’s resilience to face life’s challenges through talking, creative work and play, enabling them to focus on their education and realise their full potential. We also support parents, carers and school staff to become more ‘mentally healthy’.
We continue to pilot, trial and explore new ways in which we can develop our practice as well as share learning, expertise and findings from the robust evidence and evaluation we gather. HRH The Duchess of Cambridge is our Royal Patron and Place2Be is one of the founding charity partners of Heads Together. We also work collaboratively with a range of charities and expert organisations to leverage best-in-class knowledge and expertise to inform, develop and improve outcomes for the children, families and schools we support.
We ask our staff team to share our core values of perseverance, integrity, compassion and creativity, and to have the skills and patience to support some of the UK’s most vulnerable children and families.