Early Care And Education Mental Health Consultant

Description:

The Early Care and Education Mental Health Consultant (ECEMHC), supervised by a licensed professional, is responsible for providing early childhood mental health consultation to Allies Early Education staff and contracted Family Child Care providers (both Head Start and State), children, and families. The ECEMHC will provide a broad range of services, including strengths based, relationship oriented early childhood mental health consultation in classrooms and through home visits (for FCC providers); training and coaching staff; screening, assessment, and referral services; promotion and marketing of group services; and providing parent trainings. The ECEMHC will also collect data, maintain records, and support compliance in all facets of Head Start Performance Standards, Council on Accreditation (COA) and State regulations.

Every child needs a childhood. Allies for Every Child (Allies) exists to give at-risk children and children living in poverty the foundation they need to increase their life choices and lead fulfilling lives. For nearly 40 years, Allies has been providing thousands of at-risk children and their families with critical, high-quality child development and family wellness programs (including comprehensive early education and Early Head Start services), family strengthening interventions, foster care and adoption services, and a range of vital, integrated services, including mental health services, educational assessments, trauma and disabilities screenings/advocacy, nutrition services, dental and vision screenings, and pediatric health consultations. In 2024, Allies expanded its reach, serving even more children and youth in foster care and those transitioning to adulthood through Extraordinary Families, a program of Allies for Every Child.

To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each essential duty satisfactorily. The requirements listed below are representative of the knowledge, skill, and/or ability required. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

Consultation (60%):

Promote physical and cultural environments that encourage mental health and positive social and emotional functioning through relationship-oriented, reflective dialogues that enhance caregiver awareness of their own internal world and that of children.
Visit each assigned classroom and Family Child Care provider at least once a month.
Provide child development information related to social-emotional development and mental health.
Provide guidance to staff on selecting, implementing, and interpreting social-emotional screening and assessment tools and findings.
Improve interpersonal relationships and child outcomes.
Increase the confidence, competence, and well-being of those consulted.
Provide guidance and strategies that support our suspensions and expulsion policy and procedure
Provide guidance and model developmentally appropriate activities for children and effective ways to work with and support young children.
Meet with assigned classroom (includes FCC homes) teams (at a minimum of 1 time a month) to review classroom observations and develop and implement plans using Conscious Discipline strategies.
Provide resources to teachers, families, and early education staff following significant incidents affecting the safety or wellbeing of staff and/or children within our early education service settings.
Provide psychoeducation about child development, trauma, and strategies that support children’s emotional wellbeing to caregivers, including caregivers and educators, in order to support individualized learning and improve teaching & parenting practices.
Conduct home visits to support the mental health needs of families and children as needed
Document in the database, paper systems, and child’s file (if needed)

Child Focused Consultation (15%):

Provide individual child and family focused consultation services as needed, engaging all of the important adults in the life of a child to build capacity to support child’s mental health.
Conduct observations and assessments of individual children as assigned or referred for consultation.
If a child exhibits persistent and serious behaviors, support with the pursuit and documentation of reasonable steps to maintain the child’s safe participation in the program.
Meet with families to consult on child and family needs and to create or follow up on plans to support them.
Document in the database, paper systems, and child files

Programmatic Consultation (5%)

Participate in monthly team meetings with the Director of Early Care and Education; (Head of Educational Excellence (HEE) will join periodically.
Provide input into the development and implementation of the ECE mental health services and procedures.

Screenings, Assessments and Referrals (5%)

In collaboration with ECE Leads, support, monitoring outcomes, follow-up and referrals of standardized behavioral screening (ASQ:SE).
Provide child and family services and follow up as needed (document all in the database systems and the child’s file).
If Allies cannot provide the required services, collaborate with key partner agencies for referrals and parental support to ensure a successful partnership and document the partnership in database systems and the child’s file.