CHENANGO COUNTY – Chenango County Behavioral Health Services is working hard to get mental health services in all school districts in Chenango County.

CCBHS Director of Community Services Ruth Roberts identified the need for school based mental health services when students being referred to the main clinic weren't showing up.

“Teachers and educators were identifying kids that needed help and suggesting that they come here to the clinic and they just weren't showing up and there’s a number of reasons for that, like transportation. When talking about a remote little town, like Otselic, there are a lot of challenges for families to get here to Norwich,” said Roberts.

In Chenango County, Oxford was the first to be interested in school based mental health services.

“Finally Oxford called me and said, tell me a little bit more about school based mental health. What would that look like. They we're the pioneers here in Chenango County. We started out small, we started out providing services for a couple of days and then we grew it to where now they have a full-time clinician.” said Roberts.