AURORA | The mental health day treatment facility Cherry Creek Schools is building will officially be named Traverse Academy following a vote by the district board of education at its meeting Monday.
The name was selected out of about 40 suggestions from district community members, contractors and staff at Children’s Hospital Colorado and the University of Colorado School of Medicine, according to board documents, and Traverse was one of five finalists.
“This name is a nod to the four great Traverses in Colorado mountain climbing, representing the obstacles to be overcome to move from one great peak to the next,” board documents said.
The day treatment center will be a partnership between the district and the CU Anschutz department of psychiatry and Children’s Hospital Colorado, which will provide the clinical staff for the facility.
The center is being built with money from a $150 million bond measure approved by voters in 2020, and is expected to cost around $15 million. It is scheduled to open in the fall of 2023 at the district’s Joliet campus.
Built in response to Colorado’s dearth of intensive mental health resources for children and adolescents, the treatment center is believed to be the first of its kind partnership and has drawn national recognition. It was profiled recently in Education Week, a national publication focused on education policy.
A recent article in the Washington Post about schools using telehealth therapy for mental health treatment mentioned Cherry Creek and Aurora Public Schools, which both contracted with the online treatment provider Hazel Health this year for mental health counseling.
It’s possible that APS may be exploring creating its own mental health treatment facility as well. A document outlining potential future projects for the district that Superintendent Rico Munn put together as part of his departure mentions a day treatment center.
Munn told The Sentinel there are no concrete plans to build anything but it’s something the district is exploring as a possibility and if there’s a way it could be funded.
“There’s no secret that there is greater need for day treatment options,” he said.
At Monday’s CCSD board meeting, board member Anne Egan praised the district for its work and thanked voters for approving the bond measure.
“Cherry Creek is leading the way in mental health treatment,” Egan said.
Several speakers during public comment specifically highlighted the importance of mental health resources for LGBTQ students. This was the first meeting since the Nov. 20 shooting at a Colorado Springs gay club that killed five people.
“As a school district, anything we can do to help these children feel safe and included is a matter of life and death,” district parent Andrea Mohamedbhai said.
Lora Lei Berglund, a seventh grade student at Prairie Middle School, cited data from LGBTQ suicide prevention nonprofit the Trevor Project and asked the district to ensure that teachers are trained to be accepting of LGBTQ students.
According to a 2022 survey from the Trevor Project, 45% of LGBTQ seriously considered attempting suicide in the past year, and 60% of LGBTQ youth who wanted mental health treatment in the past year were not able to access it.
“Students should feel welcomed at school no matter what,” Berglund said.