Parents of teenagers will work with other families to pass on advice about how to look after their children's mental health, for a new project being launched by a school.
Highgate School, in London, has call on parents of sixth-form students to pass on guidance about sex, relationships, social media and even sleep.
The scheme was devised after the school's mental health peer-to-peer project, with Year 12 and Year 7 pupils, was a success.
Over the course of the Lent term, Year 12 pupils worked with mental health experts to co-produce a curriculum of five PSHE lessons. They then delivered these lessons to Year 7 pupils.
"As part of the evaluation we collected baseline questionnaires to examine the effectiveness of the project on both educational attainment and the overall wellbeing of the individuals themselves," head teacher Adam Pettitt told The Huffington Post UK.
"To date we have analysed the returned data in over 280 Year 7 pupils and particularly notable were increases in pupils’ understanding of stigma in mental health, and in pupils’ confidence to talk openly with others about their own mental health."
Pettitt said the results are very promising and have encouraged the school to now look into how they can help parents deal with their children's mental health.
"In our next steps we are keen to engage with parents to establish whether this peer-to-peer model may have the same benefits for parents and carers," he explained.
"We are aware this happens informally – seeking the advice and suggestions from a fellow parent is part of the course of parenthood – but we believe that there are some potentially important lessons, which we would like to investigate in a pilot peer-to-peer parental programme."
Pettitt said the parent mentoring scheme will kick off with a group of Year 7 parents going into the school to discuss what they want to learn.
Parents of Year 12 students will be trained to talk to these parents about how they coped with their children.
The head teacher said the scheme is likely to start in the next academic year, starting September 2016.
Nick Harrop from YoungMinds, a charity supporting young people with their mental health, told HuffPost UK: "We’re really pleased to hear about this programme, which offers an excellent example of how parents and schools can work together to support young people.
"It can be difficult to know what to say to a teenager who’s struggling with their mental health, and our helpline receives thousands of calls each year from parents who simply don’t know where to turn.
"Schemes like this one help parents to share their experiences, offer each other support and break the isolation they may feel."
This Is How Bad It Is To Be A Young Person With Mental Health Issues In 2016
Nearly a quarter of children and young people are being turned away by providers(01 of09)
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Child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) are turning away nearly a quarter (23%) of all children and young people referred to them for help by parents, GPs, teachers and others.
You might not be able to access specialist support if your BMI isn’t low enough(02 of09)
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CentreForum noted that in some cases, support for anorexia was denied unless a young person was under a certain BMI threshold. (credit:Donald Iain Smith via Getty Images)
You might not be able to get specialist support if you’re hearing voices(03 of09)
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Criteria in one area suggested those “hearing voices in the context of mild anxiety, low self-esteem or low mood” should see their GP or voluntary sector counselling service and only be referred to CAMHS if they “heard voices that command particular behaviours”. (credit:H. Armstrong Roberts/ClassicStock via Getty Images)
You might not be able to access specialist support if you've only expressed suicidal thoughts once(04 of09)
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CentreForum found one CAMHS would refer people to more generic support unless they had “enduring suicidal ideation” (i.e. they had felt they wanted to commit suicide on more than one occasion). (credit:Jacques LOIC via Getty Images)
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In some areas, referrals were not accepted unless the young person's condition was “having a major impact on the child’s life such as an inability to attend school or involving a major breakdown in family relationships”. (credit:Arvydas Kniuk?ta via Getty Images)
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CentreForum's analysis of NHS Benchmarking data found that the average of the maximum waiting times for all providers has more than doubled since 2011/12. (credit:Hero Images via Getty Images)
Maximum and average waiting times vary greatly(07 of09)
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Respondents reported maximum waiting times ranging from four weeks to over two and a half years. The average of these longest waiting times for each service was nearly 10 months for treatment to begin.
Average waiting times for different providers also varied widely, from two weeks in Cheshire to 19 weeks in North Staffordshire. The average waiting time in Gateshead is five times as long as for those in nearby Tyneside. Similarly, waits in London vary widely from two months in Kensington and Chelsea to nearly six months in neighbouring Brent. (credit:Aaron McCoy via Getty Images)
There were also 'hidden waits' concealed in average waiting times(08 of09)
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CentreForum has uncovered that the median of the maximum waiting times for all providers was 26 weeks (6 months) for a first appointment and nearly ten months (42 weeks) for the start of treatment.
Some providers did not even measure waiting times at all, meaning that some patients could even be waiting longer than this. (credit:Jupiterimages via Getty Images)
Where you live can affect how much is spent on your treatment(09 of09)
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CentreForum’s analysis of regional expenditure on mental health also revealed a North/South divide, with northern regions spending more on services while capacity problems exist in the South. (credit:Sverrir Thorolfsson Iceland via Getty Images)