INDIANAPOLIS — A community center on the east side of Indy is increasing access to mental health services for the kids and families they serve.
The move comes as a 2024 Mental Health America report found more than 66% of Indiana kids who experienced major depression did not receive the necessary treatment.
Claudia Romo started coming to Shepherd Community Center when she was 14-years-old for after school care and tutoring.
“Now I have a third grader here and an almost two-year-old,” Romo said.
The staff at Shepherd Community Center has become like family for Romo.
“They were always there for me, when I needed a computer for college, they gave me one. There were situations where I didn't have food. They would help with that,” Romo said.
“We really focus on a long-term relationship,” Andrew Green, Assistant Executive Director of Shepherd Community Center said.
Now, that relationship will also focus more on mental health.
Since the pandemic, Shepherd Community Center has seen an uptick in the need for mental health services.
“A lot of kids and families are just dealing with a lot more pressures. We see a lot of trauma, anxiety, depression, impacting kids, and families in a way that it really never has before, and a lot more intense way,” Green said.
Shepherd is starting a new partnership with mental health clinic Cartwheel.
“Cartwheel has a team of licensed therapists and child psychiatrists that deliver evidence based mental health care to students and families,” Joe English, CEO at Cartwheel said.
Cartwheel is currently working with 7 school districts across the state.
English said they are seeing record levels of mental health challenges among kids of all ages.
“When you look at the statistics on mental health challenges among kids today, it's staggering. I think two thirds of the kids in Indiana who experience severe depression are not getting treatment for that depression,” English said.
Claudia hopes her son will benefit from the partnership and access to mental health care at Shepherd Community Center.
“Sometimes he is being bullied, not here, but other places, and so he doesn't really talk about it. He just cries. So I feel like he opens up with other people more than with me, and i think that would help him a lot to like cope,” Romo said.
Cartwheel's mental health services will be available to anyone involved in Shepherd Community Center's programming as well as students at their IPS partner schools
