Abstract
Purpose: To train Community Health Workers to see themselves as contesting the diagnostic imperatives to treat “mental illness,” while recognizing and addressing structural barriers to community mental wellbeing. Method: Drawing from an analysis of course material, auto-ethnographic observations of class dynamics, and social theory from Critical Public Health and Mad Studies, this paper describes three new mental wellness modules integrated into a semester-long Community Health Worker certification course in a public housing jobs program. The class met in a public housing community center in Houston, TX and consisted of a group of 15 students, both pre-health undergraduate students and local residents, who worked in teams to discuss local definitions of mental wellness and design site-specific community mental wellness programs. Results: The modules reframe bio-psychiatric epistemology and hierarchical ideals of medical compliance in terms of political, social, and economic struggles familiar to the residents as local community health concerns. Project-based learning encouraged students to recognize personal capacity to navigate current public mental health services and to foster collective strategies promoting peer-based approaches to community wellness. Discussion: We note limits of our own pedagogical approach and indicate neoliberal pressures that preclude local definitions of mental wellness in favor of standardized learning and employment outcomes. © 2019 King Saud bin AbdulAziz University for Health Sciences
Recommended Citation
Fletcher, Erica Hua and Price, Daniel M.
(2019)
"Capacity and Non-Compliance: Mental Wellness Modules in a Community Health Worker Certification Course,"
Health Professions Education: Vol. 5:
Iss.
1, Article 9.
DOI: 10.1016/j.hpe.2017.10.002
Available at:
https://hpe.researchcommons.org/journal/vol5/iss1/9
