Tennessee Public Behavioral Health Workforce Recruitment and Outreach Initiative

Overview

The Tennessee Department of Mental Health and substance Abuse Services (TDMHSAS) in partnership with the University of Tennessee School of Social Work (UT School of SW) propose the Tennessee Public Behavioral Health Workforce Recruitment and Outreach Initiative. This initiative would utilize current staff and students at the UT School of SW to go into communities where there are low volumes of interested students entering the field of behavioral health and provide information about the public behavioral health workforce opportunities. Over the last several years, Tennessee State Government and the Tennessee General Assembly have made significant investments in both expanding and enhancing the state’s public behavioral health system. Despite the significant progress made in strengthening Tennessee’s public behavioral health system, the state’s public behavioral health system has significant challenges in recruiting and retaining an appropriate workforce. Recognizing the impact of this ongoing challenge, TDMHSAS and TennCare convened the Tennessee Public Behavioral Health Workforce Workgroup in June 2021. Serving as convenors and facilitators of this workgroup, the agencies gathered a diverse group of stakeholders and professionals, each of whom was uniquely positioned to provide insight to this critical issue. The Workgroup generated both short-term and long-term strategies to address recruitment and retention issues, one being Pipeline Planning for Public Behavioral Health Careers. This strategy is one we hope this proposal can help provide funding to implement. Through this initiative TDMHSAS and the UT School of SW will promote careers in behavioral health and create a ladders of opportunity style program that will illustrate career paths and advancement in public behavioral health. TDMHSAS and the UT School of SW will identify the areas of the state where in the past there has been low interest in this field and outreach to local high schools to provide education on the types of careers the behavioral health workforce has and the steps to achieve a career behavioral health.