At North, we pride ourselves on offering a robust array of social-emotional supports to our students on-site at no cost to them or their families. These supports include individual therapy with credentialed partner providers (Denver Health and Jewish Family Services), group interventions with school-based mental health team members, and referrals to more intensive community-based supports when appropriate.
Mental health team members each partner with a member of the counseling team to support a section of the alphabet based on students’ last names. You can find contact information for your student’s counselor here and mental health provider here.
The following information has been taken from www.verywellmind.com
Distinguishing a mental illness from hormonal changes, teenage phases, and normal mood swings becomes a challenge. But it’s important to monitor your teen’s mood and behavior and if you notice changes that interfere with your teen’s daily life, it likely isn’t normal. Mental illness presents differently in different people. Some warning signs of teenage mental illness include (but are not limited to) these behaviors.
Non-Emergency Resources:
Adolescence is a time of immense changes for high school students. It can be a time of both disorientation and discovery. The transitional period can bring up issues of independence and self-identity; many adolescents and their peers face tough choices regarding schoolwork, sexuality, drugs, alcohol, and social life. Peer groups, romantic interests and external appearance tend to naturally increase in importance for some time during a teen’s journey toward adulthood.
Adolescence is a transitional period that requires special attention and protection. Physically, children go through a number of changes while they mature. We now know that the brain undergoes quite substantial developments in early adolescence, which affect emotional skills as well as physical and mental abilities. Adolescence is also when gender norms are either solidified, rejected or transformed. As adolescent girls and boys grow, they take on additional responsibilities, experiment with new ways of doing things and push for independence. It is a time in which values and skills are developed that have a great impact on well-being.
Evidence shows that when adolescents are supported and encouraged by caring adults, along with policies and services attentive to their needs and capabilities, they have the potential to break long-standing cycles of poverty, discrimination and violence.
North High offers a spectrum of wrap-around Student Support services to assist our students during this period of change. In addition to the systems and staff members listed below, North students benefit from the many community partners working with our students on a daily basis.
The Student Support Team’s philosophy is based on Restorative Practice. Restorative Practice is grounded in the guiding principle that everyone has a voice in any situation of wrong doing. Restorative Practice supports thriving relationships, student voice and accountability among students, their peers, and educators. While there are often consequences for wrong doing, reparation of harm is used in place of suspension as often as circumstances allow.
What are Restorative Circles? The Circle is a structured dialog process that nurtures connections and empathy, while honoring the uniqueness of each participant. The Circle can hold pain, joy, despair, hope, anger, love, fear, and paradox. In the Circle, each person has the opportunity to speak his/her truth but cannot assume the truth for anyone else. Circles that are held seek to repair harm that has been done, create communities and welcome all, or simply inform a community about a certain topic.
North High School is on the cutting edge of how we support our students with Restorative Practice and adopted Restorative Practices in 2006 as part of the DPS pilot initiative. Read the June, 2019, NEA Today article about RP at North High.
Click for additional articles on Restorative Practice. “Restorative Practices in Schools” and “Restorative Practices in Schools for Discipline, Explained”.
North Mental Health Team
School psychologists and school social workers are uniquely qualified members of school teams who provide direct educational, behavioral, and mental health services for children and youth, as well as work with families, school administrators, educators, and other professionals to create supportive learning and social environments for all students. School Social Workers and School Psychologists have expertise and training in mental health, learning, and behavior.
Please visit our website for more information on our initiatives at North, as well as resources for you and your family.
The Deans and Student Support Liaisons at North are an integral part of our school community. Our Student Support Team comes with 35+ years of combined experience in education. The Student Support Team’s philosophy is based on Restorative Practice. Restorative Practice is grounded in the guiding principle that everyone has a voice in any situation of wrong doing. Restorative Practice supports thriving relationships, student voice and accountability among students, their peers, and educators. While there are often consequences for wrong doing, reparation of harm is used in place of suspension as often as circumstances allow. North High School works to keep all students in the classroom accessing their education but at times suspension may be used. Deans, Student Support Liaisons and North High’s larger Student Support Team recognize the value in finding the root cause for behaviors and will work with your family on identifying resources that may be of assistance if your child struggles with his or her behavior and/or attendance.
North High School Culture Team:
Classes of 2027 & 2028:
Dean Manny Marquez (manuel_marquez1@dpsk12.net)
Dean Marisa Lucio (marisa_lucio@dpsk12.net)
Dean Mack Gaddis (stephaun_gaddis@dpsk12.net)
Student Support Lead Alyssa Perez (alyssa_perez@dpsk12.net)
Student Support Lead AJ Carter (anthony_carter6@dpsk12.net)
Student Support Lead Val Finn (valerie_finn@dpsk12.net)
Classes of 2025 & 2026:
Dean Stormye Everett (stormye_everett@dpsk12.net)
Student Support Lead Suzanne Mapatano (suzanne_mapatano@dpsk12.net)
Assistant Principal overseeing Culture Team: Elizabeth Laughlin (elizabeth_laughlin@dpsk12.net)
Advisory is key to the close-knit, family culture at North. At North High School we believe it is crucial that EVERY SINGLE STUDENT feels connected to and supported by at least one adult in our community; additionally we want to make sure that every student has a small group of peers who they can get to know well and build supportive, positive relationships with throughout the year. Advisory is this support for students; during Advisory we work to build character skills, study and organizational skills, and strengthen our community through empathy building activities and helping each student to value the differences of our student body.
Students meet with their small Advisory class and teacher weekly for an hour. Advisory teachers focus on establishing close relationships with their students and getting to know their students’ families as well. Students are able to forge friendships with students from different backgrounds and outside their usual group of friends.
North High School believes in every student. In fact, our mission statement emphasizes our end goal as “catalyzing the academic and personal success of all students.” Part of this work is also innovating and implementing systems that may not be in every traditional high school.
At North, we have created a GT team composed of educators, administrators, support staff and an itinerant GT specialist. The goal of this team is to inform ourselves and our staff members on best practices in identifying and supporting all students who are under the umbrella of Gifted and Talented—this can mean Highly Gifted and Talented, Gifted and Talented, Twice Exceptional, and those in the talent pool.
We have piloted GT programming through Advisement class and have grown that program to include GT-specific advisement groups at all grade levels. With the support of Advisement mentors and our new GT Itinerant, students will create their ALP, learn to advocate for themselves, and receive intentional social-emotional education to meet the needs of advanced learners. Our GT team will be providing yearlong support and ALP goal monitoring while building the capacity of staff to ensure all of our students’ success is catalyzed.
You can find a wealth of GT resources and information on the DPS GT website.
Please contact CJ Relford, GT Itinerant Teacher, with any questions at christopher_relford@dpsk12.net
We know that students thrive in environments where there are high expectations, high stability and structure, and high levels of consistency. As we have set up North’s behavioral intervention systems and structures, we have kept each of these values in mind striving to create a robust, sustainable intervention system that support us in maintaining a productive and positive school environment.