For schools

At The Anchor Practice we offer a variety of clinical, consultative and policy development services to schools in the public and private sectors - across primary, secondary and specialist provisions. Our clinicians can provide in-house mental health services for pupils or can offer individual consultations as required.

Recent policy developments at a national level have resulted in a more significant expectation that schools provide in house resources to support and maintain good child mental health and promote the emotional development and resilience of their pupils. At The Anchor Practice, our clinicians have assisted many schools in finding a package of support which suits the individual needs of their institution in a clinically effective and cost effective manner.

The Anchor Practice can provide a wide range of services including:

Direct clinical work
Clinicians can be allocated to schools for between one to three days, during which time they can see individual children, help with assessing complex students and also support staff throughout the process.

Consultative services to senior leadership teams
Our clinicians are experienced in helping school leadership think about planning whole school approaches to mental health and emotional well-being, consulting regarding the mental health aspects of complex safeguarding issues and providing back up and support for staff across a wide range of issues.

Work discussion groups for staff
The Anchor Practice clinicians can facilitate group sessions to support staff at all levels of an organisation in thinking about and developing their roles within the school. Work discussion is a cost-effective way of supporting those members of staff who have the most contact with a school’s most complex students.

Education and training
We can provide bespoke training for staff on child and adolescent mental health over a range of topics.

Parent support and coffee mornings
We also offer informal, termly or ad hoc coffee mornings for parents, where brief presentations on various aspects of child mental health are given, followed by a Q&A session for parents. Previous topics have included Adolescent Depression, Social Media and Mental Health and Transition to Secondary School.

At Merchiston, the wellbeing of our pupils isn’t an add-on, it’s a foundation for everything we do. When young people face personal challenges, we want to ensure they have immediate access to high-quality, professional support that equips them with lifelong tools for self-awareness and resilience. The agreement also allows us to strengthen our staff capacity, embedding professional mental health knowledge and frameworks across our wellbeing provision. We’re particularly excited by the upskilling opportunities for our team and the chance to lead the way in what pastoral care can look like in schools.”