New Article Feature: Psychometric Evidence for the School Organizational Conditions for Mental Health Programming Measure

A new study study led by the AYM team and conducted in partnership with School Mental Health Ontario outlines the development and validation of a new measure to assess the organizational conditions of schools to successfully implement and sustain mental health programming (i.e., their capacity, readiness, and resources).

The study leveraged data from the School Mental Health Principal Survey, which included data from 721 principals across 35 Ontario school boards. The team developed a brief, 14-item measure—the “School Organizational Conditions for Mental Health Programming Measure”—which captures four key domains: (1) School Mental Health Leadership, (2) Engagement and Collaboration with External Partners, (3) Mental Health Strategy and Action Planning, and (4) Data-Informed Quality Improvement. The measure showed strong psychometric properties. These findings support the use of this measure to capture progress and guide planning towards implementing and sustaining school mental health programming.

Check out the original investigation, entitled “Psychometric Evidence for the School Organizational Conditions for Mental Health Programming Measure: Assessing the Organizational Context for Implementing Evidence-Informed Programming in Ontario Schools,” authored by Drs. Nicole Dryburgh, Li Wang, Ruth Repchuck, Alisha R. Matte, Kevin Runions, and Kathy Georgiades.

This article was published in School Mental Health in January 2025.