A new statewide plan to address the rising rates of mental health issues among students is getting serious pushback. The Murphy administration announced a plan to effectively end a system of school-based youth services that’s been in place for nearly 40 years. It would be replaced with a regional model that operates outside the schools in hopes of providing more mental health resources. This would come at a time when students are experiencing heightened levels of depression and anxiety since the onset of the pandemic. Mental health reporter Bobby Brier brings us the latest on the proposal and the protests against it in partnership with Report for America.
Opposition builds against revamping school mental health services
Advocates say if a regional model was to take place, a lot of the relationships that were formed would no longer exist
Anchor
An Emmy award-winning journalist, Briana Vannozzi serves as the anchor for NJ Spotlight News, the newsroom of NJ PBS. She's worked in several capacities since joining the news division in 2012, as interim anchor and senior correspondent after years of general assignment reporting as a multimedia journalist. Vannozzi began her television journalism career by cutting her teeth on New Jersey State House politics for New Jersey Network News, and later as a news radio correspondent at FM News 101.9 covering crime and politics in New York City. Her work has taken her to national presidential nominating conventions, Capitol Hill, up and down the East Coast and every corner of the Garden State. She's interviewed every New Jersey governor dating back to Jon Corzine and moderated numerous political debates and forums. Her work has also earned awards from the New Jersey Society of Professional Journalists and the Philadelphia Press Association. A Burlington County native, she's honored to be serving and covering her home state and raising her family there.