 Thank you very much, and it's a real privilege to close off what has been an incredibly productive day of incredibly inspiring day Hearing from so many people with unique and valuable perspectives Speak with us. We began of course, I think appropriately with somebody who's recognized as an exemplary leader around mental health at British Columbia Dr. Santa Ono shared with us his courageous personal story and And had then blasted out of here to go and spread it around the rest of the country and in Ontario and I especially Appreciate the work that he has done on his own campus and not only has he shared his stories He's done something about it in the leadership role that he is to help the lives of students at UBC campus we then heard of course Dr. Peter Senge who had I Didn't know what systems thinking was either To be honest, I thought it was like a cabinet subcommittee that I wasn't a member of and Was thankful of that But I think he broke that down rather well and really talked about how We have to look at We have to draw upon the strengths that we have we have to look at how we can confront problems and we have to think about how we can make the greatest impact for the a very very large number of people and Trust in students themselves to be able to help give constant feedback into the interventions that we try and make to for them to lead better lives and And transition into adulthood successfully Monique Gray Smith was amazing. I Almost jumped up and tried to grab one of the books. I thought that would be bad form though. I See if we have room in our budget to get me one, but It was just incredible Both to talk about Just the point about wisdom I think that was one of the one of your best of many Fantastic stories within that presentation and how it was something within both the young and the old and you talked about that 11-year-old boy And then you concluded with I think a very uplifting and hopeful Vision of what reconciliation should look like and indeed I'm very proud to be part of a government that not only in my own Ministry, but in every ministry of government is committed to reconciliation and all we do we just happen to be positioned to have a huge huge impact on what reconciliation Will do to to change the lives of indigenous and non-indigenous kids in the years ahead. So thank you very much for being here So we had a lot of food for thought we had some fantastic practical examples from our friends at school district 42 We have a lot of people in the room here Who will yet share their perspectives on day two and tomorrow? We will have more young people to strut their stuff and to tell us about their lives and how we has grown up so you know a lot supposedly and actually do but how we can help them and understand them and and Hone our practice to be more effective. I want to just conclude by a couple of things To say a couple of things about government action We have worked very very hard over the past 18 months and it's an exhausting 18 months I can't believe It's only been 18 months, but that's how long that's how long ago it was that we were sworn in But to build a seamless and coordinated Governments that will be able to across ministries Help come up with an effective mental health strategy. We've of course responded to some things that are incredibly urgent Minister Darcy has talked about the opioid crisis We have looked at mental health responses in in communities and in the school system I was amazed that we had never done a conference like this a Year ago even to have the conversation to get the right people in the room here We have a room double the size To carry that work forward and we're making sure that all the ministries are working together as I mentioned I don't want to give a couple of examples about that because we've got a couple of recent Announcements that we've made including one today First of all, I know she's not here, but I want to thank minister Darcy for taking the time to be here today She is a colossal force in the government for mental well-being and I really appreciate her as a colleague It's always nice to see one of your colleagues when you're back in their local community and see how well regarded they are And I was a new Westminster with her a couple of months ago We had a groundbreaking on New Westminster Secondary School, which is going to which is going to be a huge campus 2000 students the largest high school in the province and The chair of the school district Mark Gifford, I don't know if he's in the room here Introduced her and said it's so great to have Minister Darcy Here and in power to be able to attend this groundbreaking And then he corrected to myself because actually I don't think minister Darcy has ever been without power But She she has particularly worked closely with my ministry with the minister of children of family development Again to bring that integrated approach to how we Respond to the mental health needs of our population our young population in particular Last year's conference was very valuable. I have to say in terms of informing The school-based components of a cross-government mental health and addiction strategy One that's focused on improving access to services. We've done a number of things to do that Early prevention We're doing a number of things to help awareness and to help Those who do that work and to promote youth mental health overall in the community, but we have a lot more to announce on that and I'm looking forward to getting back into the legislature the Cross-government mental health youth mental health strategy will be announced by minister Darcy appropriately In the very near future But I do want to give everyone as a final thought for the first afternoon of the conference that The commitment to a focus on mental health in the Ministry of Education is not Confined to a conference here or there. I want you to understand that to the year 2019 We hope to use the momentum that all of you gave us last year and continue to give us To to make this a multi-year process. We are going to go forward with a focus on mental health for as long as we need till we get better and better at it until more and more young people are able to To to feel that they have the supports that they need to be successful. So Take that thought away with you on the first afternoon of the conference also want to share with you There's been a lot of great work done in in just recent years recent months even around the curriculum transformation, for example Incredible work by hundreds of people to incorporate mental health in the K to 12 Curriculum a few years ago. We wouldn't be talking about that. It was missing and conspicuous by its absence Mental well-being today is one of our key components of the physical and health education curriculum people There are teachers and involved in the school system Know that it starts in kindergarten it starts at the youngest age and Today's new curriculum is helping kids understand issues that they face You know recognizing anxiety and depression Understanding that major changes in your life Play a role in mental well-being kids go through sometimes ugly divorces they witness violence they see all kinds of things in their lives and They come to school where there are some grown-ups that may be able to help them when they can't get the help They need in their families or or their neighbors and we know that from surveying students We talked about this last year as well We surveyed them annually that school connectedness is the most important thing in their lives to feel like They have hope and to feel like they're part of a broader community family connectedness is important But school connectedness is the number one factor for them feeling okay with their place in the world so that speaks to how important the work that we do is and How we should all be focused on making school connectedness our number one aim And that's why the conference is really around school community Mental health because that's where it all happens for young people The curriculum also helps Young people get skills and knowledge about how to advocate for themselves, which is critically important so They have self-care strategies that they can advocate for themselves that they understand that there are resources in The community if and when they need them I want to say also that we're supporting the mental health and well-being of students in other ways It has been tremendously helpful that in just the last 18 months We have a hundred and forty more educational psychologists in the school system than we did in the 2016 2017 school year In every part of the province. It's a result of the memorandum of agreement. We signed with the BC teachers Federation We need a lot more And we will hire them when we get more and we're training more to do that work that kind of specialist education instructor position is very valuable and One that our ministry of supporting BC students are benefiting from new school-based Supports that are focused on mental health promotion on prevention and early intervention We just announced today, and I want to spend a minute just explaining it to That the Ministry of Education will spend a share of federal resources That our province has been allocated for mental health and addictions Promotion that this is money that will has been announced for the next five years Our first year installment today was to invest three million dollars in the school system To do a number of things one of them is around leadership training The other is early action initiative grants every each and every six of the 60 school districts will receive a grant independent schools will as well and You should have the 60 school district representatives who are in the room already received your grant letters And if you haven't Jen McCrae is my assistant deputy minister, and she will give you a grant letter tomorrow, but One of the important things about this money is that it's extremely flexible You can use it for Staff training sessions you can use it for parent information nights. You can use it for workshops for students in the school system you can use it for new resource materials to be developed for educators for families for community organizations and And you can use it to support professional development You can use it to start a new program or you can use it to support an existing innovative program that you've already Started and I know there are so many that we can be proud of in school districts right around BC So we want it to be flexible. It is flexible funding and it will be available immediately for the district So when you come out of here with ideas There's a little bit of money for each of your districts to go and do something with it right away With access to new mental health programs and services We want students to be able to get more help when they need it and where they need it and With the innovation skills and leadership that we're seeing in districts all over British Columbia, I got to say I'm pretty excited to see What we're gonna be talking about in a year from now or nine months we do the conference every nine months, right annual What will that be November I guess I don't want to kill my stuff But whenever we gather next to see what how much further we are along feeling some of the gaps and improving better services and Using the the peer contact that you have over these two days to inspire Each other to do what works well in your own districts Minister Darcy also highlighted today that the Ministry of Children and Family Development Under the leadership of Minister Katrina Conroy has developed a new anxiety prevention workshop and classroom resource called ease Remember the acronym. I don't even have to say it again, right? You've already memorized it and internalized it Everyday anxiety strategy for educators But knowing that how prevalent anxiety is for children and youth today and the impact that can have in their classrooms This is a timely made in BC resource An anti anxiety prevention strategy that will benefit children throughout their lives Teachers will benefit because they will receive resources and strategies how to integrate anxiety prevention strategies into their everyday classroom routines and The ease workshops will be provided everywhere at no cost to BC teachers No cost to school counselors and other educators and will be offered at two developmental levels kindergarten to grade three and grades four to seven so The workshop and the resources are a result of a collaboration between ministries MCFD in this case a mental health Canada anxiety Canada and other partners so There's one last thing I want to highlight as we end the day here I'm very excited as well that we have been doing a lot of work on It's not a new program But it's a vastly updated program and you'll all be familiar with erase Which Initially was designed to foster school connectedness. It was about addressing bullying preventing violence It provides support to school districts For critical incidents for example lockdowns all those kind of procedures that a few years ago people didn't know how to do properly They now we're now looking at expanding it to address some of the challenges that students are facing that we perhaps didn't imagine before so the focus will Has already grown and extended to social media and cyberbullying and I see Andrea Sinclair here from VCC pack who has Given workshops to over 10,000 parents with the expanded erase funding on exactly that cyberbullying Now it's going to focus on mental health and it will focus on a couple of other things guns and gangs in school Is a real problem in a number of communities around British Columbia unfortunately and the erase strategy is going to expand to to address that So as a result this school year the province will be expanding a race It's going to be a better more comprehensive resource it's going to better represent issues that face youth in in different communities around British Columbia and It will it will as I said focus on gang prevention social media and online safety and I think critically important and we've already started doing this a year ago But we have to continue to do it so long as people want to Make an issue out of it and they aren't ever kids The erase strategy is going to keep supporting sexual orientation and gender identity Supports for youth in every school district in every part of British Columbia, and that's my commitment as the Minister of Education You'll hear more about that we will have formal announcements about the expansion of a race in different communities and We will talk about improved online safety tools that will be available for everybody to use But listen, I want to thank everybody for their energy for their attention for their ideas For being here for taking time out of your busy professional lives I hope that this opening day of the conference has been very valuable for you And I know that we got a lot of momentum going into day two So thank you very very much and to all the presenters and to Maria LaRose Our expert facilitator. Thank you very much