Testimony Before the Council of the District of Columbia Performance Oversight Hearing: Committee on Health - Department of Behavioral Health (DBH)

By Nicole Travers

Senior Director of Strategic Partnerships

Good morning, Chairperson Henderson and members of the Committee. My name is Nicole Travers, and I serve as the Senior Director of Strategic Partnerships at the DC Charter School Alliance, the local nonprofit that advocates on behalf of public charter schools to ensure every student can choose a high-quality public school that prepares them for lifelong success. I also serve on the School Behavioral Health Coordinating Council and currently co-chair the Every Day Counts Guidance and Communication Working Group. Before this role, I was a Ward 7 high school principal, working directly with students, families, and school-based mental health teams.

The DC Charter School Alliance has appeared before this body for more than five years, consistently raising concerns about school behavioral health capacity and access. I want to thank DBH and Dr. Bazron for recognizing that our current school-based mental health model is not fully addressing students’ needs and for exploring alternative solutions. We appreciate the invitation to youth and family advocacy representatives to participate in the Coordinating Council. That inclusion and collaboration matter. I also want to thank Erica Barnes, Branch Chief, School-Based Behavioral Health Program, and Dr. Charneta Scott for conducting additional environmental scan outreach with charter LEAs that were not included in the May 2025 data collection. Having high-quality data to inform decisions on the next steps for the school-based mental health program is crucial.

Across the country, students’ mental health needs go unmet - a persistent and widespread challenge. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, only 48 percent of public schools report being able to effectively provide mental health services to all students who need them—a nearly 10-point decline since the 2021–22 school year. The most commonly cited barriers include insufficient staffing, inadequate funding, and limited access to licensed professionals.

Here in DC, the challenge is just as urgent. Data from the DC Policy Center shows that 40 percent of students were chronically absent during the 2023–24 school year—a trend frequently linked to unmet emotional, social, or clinical needs, particularly in the post-pandemic context. In Wards 5 through 8, between 25 and 38 percent of charter schools lack an on-site DBH or CBO mental health professional, limiting students’ ability to access care during the school day. Further
heightening this concern, of the nine charter campuses without nurse or health technician coverage, seven also lack a mental health provider (78%), leaving schools to fund critical resources and wraparound support with their per-pupil funding.

While we recognize DBH’s goal to address unacceptably high vacancy rates and expand support in a challenging fiscal environment, our overarching concern is that the program models proposed in the comprehensive plan are built on incomplete and opaque data collection from schools, coupled with a lack of clarity around how the proposed models will be assigned to schools. That concern is amplified due to the aggressive, likely unrealistic implementation
timeline.

The proposed in-house service delivery model will have significant implications for student well-being and academic achievement. While it may expand the number of schools with an assigned clinician, it also risks creating additional gaps in care, inequitable access, and unintended harm. For example, the cluster model would allow unlicensed prevention specialists
to implement Tier 1 supports. Because this position cannot diagnose or provide clinical treatment, this approach risks role confusion among school staff and families. It may lead to unintentional reliance on unlicensed personnel beyond their scope of practice. Additionally, rotating cluster teams across up to four schools—as outlined in the plan—poses challenges for coordination, building trust with students, and maintaining consistent treatment plans. This instability can negatively affect therapeutic outcomes, particularly for students coping with ongoing trauma and its aftermath.

We remain deeply concerned about three core issues, and we offer the following recommendations:

First, the proposed DBH-pronged service delivery model—and the pace of its implementation—pose risks of unintended harm to students. Abrupt provider transitions and the elimination of existing clinical relationships disrupt continuity of care and can negatively impact social-emotional development, attendance, and academic outcomes. We strongly encourage a phased rollout of the proposal, accompanied by a published timeline and a clear evaluation framework for both DBH and community-based providers. This approach would enable course corrections and alignment with lessons learned from DC Health’s school-based medical model transition, which is currently underway.

Second, the environmental scan data used to inform model development and school designation decisions were not shared with school leaders for review or validation. This data has also not been shared in any detailed manner with the Coordinating Council. This limited the Council’s ability to collectively identify gaps across wards, school types, or student populations. We recommend that schools be allowed to review the environmental scan data and advocate for model types based on their needs, at least six months to one year before model assignments are finalized, using a transparent rubric with clear, objective criteria.

Third, this model does not expand in-person clinical capacity; instead, it spreads current capacity across more schools and transitions high schools and adult schools to a telehealth model. We recommend that the telehealth component be at least hybrid for high schools, so students can build genuine relationships with their clinician before transitioning to telehealth sessions. The reality is that many teenagers will not be willing to meet with clinicians whom they’ve never met
in person.

Additionally, DC can address persistent vacancies by developing its pipeline and entering into reciprocity agreements with neighboring states, thereby expanding the pool of qualified clinicians available to serve students. This approach supports homegrown solutions and builds on successful initiatives such as The Momentum Residency, which partners with charter schools like E.W. Stokes and Rocketship through the Pilot 1B program to provide full-time, school-employed clinicians with structured training, supervision, and professional development tailored to school communities.

Overall, we recognize the fiscal realities facing the District. However, we strongly recommend ongoing, proactive dialogue with schools well in advance of program changes, grounded in transparency, trust, and shared problem-solving.

In closing, the DC Charter School Alliance remains committed to partnering with the District to ensure that all students especially those most vulnerable—have timely, equitable access to high-quality mental health support.

Thank you for your time and attention. I welcome your questions.