School-Based Mental Health Effectiveness Study

August 17, 2026 updated by: NYU Langone Health

Effectiveness and Implementation of an Early Childhood School-Based Mental Health Intervention in Low-Resource Communities

This study involves efforts to advance the science of prevention in early childhood mental health in low-resource communities. Investigators will assess the effectiveness, practical implementation strategies, and underlying mechanisms of the evidence-based intervention, ParentCorps-Professional Development, in urban and rural Uganda. Two implementation approaches, with and without the teacher stress management package, T-Wellness, will be compared for efficacy.

Study Overview

Status

Status

Indicates the current recruitment status or the expanded access status.
Completed

Conditions

Conditions

The disease, disorder, syndrome, illness, or injury that is being studied. On ClinicalTrials.gov, conditions may also include other health-related issues, such as lifespan, quality of life, and health risks.

Intervention / Treatment

Intervention / Treatment

A process or action that is the focus of a clinical study. Interventions include drugs, medical devices, procedures, vaccines, and other products that are either investigational or already available. Interventions can also include noninvasive approaches, such as education or modifying diet and exercise.

Detailed Description

Promoting child mental health in low-resource or low-income country settings faces numerous challenges in global health research. Although efforts have been made to improve mental health interventions and services for young children, evidence-based interventions (EBIs) for children in low-and middle-income countries (LMICs) are limited. Most mental health EBIs in LMICs have not been scaled widely, and do not focus on early childhood. Mechanisms of action and effectiveness are not well understood. Additionally, most EBIs in LMICs rely on community health workers (CHWs) or a task-shifting approach of implementation because of resource barriers and shortage of mental health professionals (MHPs). However, challenges related to task-shifting (e.g., CHW stress and job burnout) have rarely been studied. For task-shifting to be successful, strategies to overcome challenges faced by CHWs and understanding mechanisms to conduct effective task-shifting are paramount. The overall goal of this study is to address these EBI effectiveness and implementation knowledge gaps by providing a preventive EBI (mWEL-Professional Development (PD), adapted from the US ParentCorps-Professional Development) that utilizes a task-shifting and a scalable implementation model to promote early childhood students' mental health in a LMIC-Uganda. PD is a school-based EBI and preventive mental health service provision model that supports teachers and school personnel to apply EBI strategies to promote young children's mental health. The PD approach represents a task-shifting model of mental healthcare by shifting mental health preventive duties from professionals to teachers to optimize school children's mental health. Therefore, teachers are considered as CHWs. This study examines impacts and cost-effectiveness of the EBI/PD on teachers and students, as well as examines underlying mechanisms (or theories of change) that contribute to intervention effect. In addition, considering most Ugandan teachers (or CHWs) experience occupational stress that threatens PD uptake, effectiveness, and sustainment, this study will also test a teacher stress management package (T-Wellness, adapted from EBIs) as an enhancement to PD. This study will investigate whether PD + T-Wellness (PDT) is more effective for CHWs/teachers than PD alone.

Study Type

Study Type

Describes the nature of a clinical study. Study types include interventional studies (also called clinical trials), observational studies (including patient registries), and expanded access.
Interventional

Enrollment (Actual)

Enrollment

The number of participants in a clinical study. The "anticipated" enrollment is the target number of participants that the researchers need for the study.
2444

Phase

Phase

The stage of a clinical trial studying a drug or biological product, based on definitions developed by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The phase is based on the study's objective, the number of participants, and other characteristics. There are five phases: Early Phase 1 (formerly listed as Phase 0), Phase 1, Phase 2, Phase 3, and Phase 4. Not Applicable is used to describe trials without FDA-defined phases, including trials of devices or behavioral interventions.
  • Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

This section provides the contact details for those conducting the study, and information on where this study is being conducted.

Study Contact

Study Contact

The name and contact information for the person who can answer enrollment questions for a clinical study. Each location where the study is being conducted may also have a specific contact, who may be better able to answer those questions.

Study Locations

  • Uganda
      • Hoima, Uganda
        • Hoima School
      • Kampala, Uganda
        • Kampala School

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

The key requirements that people who want to participate in a clinical study must meet or the characteristics they must have. Eligibility criteria consist of both inclusion criteria (which are required for a person to participate in the study) and exclusion criteria (which prevent a person from participating). Types of eligibility criteria include whether a study accepts healthy volunteers, has age or age group requirements, or is limited by sex.

Ages Eligible for Study

18 years to 65 years (Adult, Older Adult)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

In order to be eligible to participate in this study, an individual must meet all of the following criteria:

  1. The inclusion criteria for the school staff (teachers, head teachers) are: they must be in the recruited study schools and teaching in Pre-Primary to Primary 4 classrooms or holding the head teachers/administration leadership position in school. The inclusion criteria for Parent Leaders are: they must be at least 18 years old and have served as a Parent-Teacher-Association member or Parent Leader in the school for at least 1 year.
  2. The inclusion criteria for the PD/PDT program implementers are: they must have current employment with eligible partners (i.e., medical/mental health institutions, Teacher Training Colleges), with professional experiences in teacher training or mental health training.
  3. The inclusion criteria for parents are: caregivers must be at least 18 years old, their children must be enrolled in Pre-Primary or Primary 1 to 4 classes (or between 3 to 10 years old) in the recruited schools, and willing to have their child to be assessed by research staff. Parents and children will have diverse characteristics (e.g., randomly selected from school student lists). About 10% families will be randomly selected from the student lists. The proposed study will be open to both men and women caregivers

Exclusion Criteria

An individual who meets any of the following criteria will be excluded from participation in this study:

  1. Evidence of psychopathology or cognitive impairment severe enough to preclude giving consent, or completing the survey instruments or the focus group of the study.
  2. Minors (age <18) will also be excluded. Additional criteria should be included as appropriate for the study design and risk.

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Primary Purpose: Other
  • Allocation: Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
  • Masking: Single

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm

Participant Group / Arm

A group or subgroup of participants in a clinical trial that receives a specific intervention/treatment, or no intervention, according to the trial's protocol.
Intervention / Treatment

Intervention / Treatment

A process or action that is the focus of a clinical study. Interventions include drugs, medical devices, procedures, vaccines, and other products that are either investigational or already available. Interventions can also include noninvasive approaches, such as education or modifying diet and exercise.
Experimental: ParentCorps-Professional Development (PD)

n = 6 Schools in Kampala, Uganda (Urban) - 89 Teachers, 325 Parent-Child Pairs

+ n = 10 Schools in Hoima, Uganda (Rural) - 98 Teachers, 344 Parent-Child Pairs
Behavioral: ParentCorps-Professional Development (PD)
Multi-component school-based intervention that promotes early childhood mental health and development. Teachers (pre-primary to 4th grade) will participate in a 3-day ParentCorps-PD training during the school term. They will also receive 8 sessions (8 hours) of face-to-face group-based coaching during after the training. Coaching sessions are to help teachers apply EBI strategies in their classrooms, engage families, and develop competencies.
Experimental: ParentCorps-Professional Development (PD) + T-Wellness

n = 6 Schools in Kampala, Uganda (Urban) - 77 Teachers, 300 Parent-Child Pairs

+ n = 10 Schools in Hoima, Uganda (Rural) - 80 Teachers, 329 Parent-Child Pairs
Behavioral: ParentCorps-Professional Development (PD)
Multi-component school-based intervention that promotes early childhood mental health and development. Teachers (pre-primary to 4th grade) will participate in a 3-day ParentCorps-PD training during the school term. They will also receive 8 sessions (8 hours) of face-to-face group-based coaching during after the training. Coaching sessions are to help teachers apply EBI strategies in their classrooms, engage families, and develop competencies.
Behavioral: T-Wellness
A brief teacher stress management psychoeducation package, adapted from EBIs including one-day workshop for common stress management and stress management, and three follow-up group support sessions (3 additional monthly 1-hr wellness sessions for teachers as a group that were integrated into the 3 of the 8 PD coaching sessions. A total 3 hours of coaching were included.
No Intervention: Control

n = 6 Schools in Kampala, Uganda (Urban) - 73 Teachers, 316 Parent-Child Pairs

+ n = 9 Schools in Hoima, Uganda (Rural) - 92 Teachers, 321 Parent-Child Pairs

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Primary Outcome Measures

In a clinical study's protocol, the planned outcome measure that is the most important for evaluating the effect of an intervention/treatment. Most clinical studies have one primary outcome measure, but some have more than one.
Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Teacher Knowledge of Evidence-Based Practice (Knowledge Score)
Time Frame: Baseline
Teachers will complete a 10-item quiz assessing EBI knowledge. The total score is the number of correct responses and ranges from 0-100; higher scores indicate greater knowledge.
Baseline
Teacher Knowledge of Evidence-Based Practice (Knowledge Score)
Time Frame: Month 6
Teachers will complete a 10-item quiz assessing EBI knowledge. The total score is the number of correct responses and ranges from 0-100; higher scores indicate greater knowledge.
Month 6
Child's Emotion Regulation Score
Time Frame: Baseline
Parents answer 6 questions about their child's emotion regulation behavior over the past 7 days. Each item is rated on a Likert scale from 0 (not at all) to 4 (very well). The total score ranges from 0 to 4; higher scores indicate greater emotion regulation.
Baseline
Child's Emotion Regulation Score
Time Frame: Month 6
Parents answer 6 questions about their child's emotion regulation behavior over the past 7 days. Each item is rated on a Likert scale from 0 (not at all) to 4 (very well). The total score ranges from 0 to 4; higher scores indicate greater emotion regulation.
Month 6
Child's Emotion Regulation Score
Time Frame: Month 18
Parents answer 6 questions about their child's emotion regulation behavior over the past 7 days. Each item is rated on a Likert scale from 0 (not at all) to 4 (very well). The total score ranges from 0 to 4; higher scores indicate greater emotion regulation.
Month 18
Teacher EBI Practice Score
Time Frame: Baseline
Use of Evidence-Based Practices was assessed with six measures: (i) Practice of evidence-based strategies (applied a range of evidence-based behavioral management strategies such as praise and proactive strategies) (9 items, 1-5 point scale); (ii) Non-harsh discipline (4 items, 1-5 point scale); (iii) Mindfulness (awareness of own actions and consideration of student's situations when interacting or disciplining students) (10 items, 1-4 point scale); (iv) Emotion socialization-supporting negative emotion (practice used to support students in managing negative emotions) (6 items, 1-5 point scale); (v) Family engagement (frequency in interacting with families) (2 items, 1-5 point scale); and (vi) Teacher-Student Interaction (5 items, 1-5 point scale). The final score is a mean composite of these six measures and ranges from 1-5; where higher scores indicate greater use of EBI practices.
Baseline
Teacher EBI Practice Score
Time Frame: Month 6
Use of Evidence-Based Practices was assessed with six measures: (i) Practice of evidence-based strategies (applied a range of evidence-based behavioral management strategies such as praise and proactive strategies) (9 items, 1-5 point scale); (ii) Non-harsh discipline (4 items, 1-5 point scale); (iii) Mindfulness (awareness of own actions and consideration of student's situations when interacting or disciplining students) (10 items, 1-4 point scale); (iv) Emotion socialization-supporting negative emotion (practice used to support students in managing negative emotions) (6 items, 1-5 point scale); (v) Family engagement (frequency in interacting with families) (2 items, 1-5 point scale); and (vi) Teacher-Student Interaction (5 items, 1-5 point scale). The final score is a mean composite of these six measures and ranges from 1-5; where higher scores indicate greater use of EBI practices.
Month 6
Teacher EBI Practice Score
Time Frame: Month 18
Use of Evidence-Based Practices was assessed with six measures: (i) Practice of evidence-based strategies (applied a range of evidence-based behavioral management strategies such as praise and proactive strategies) (9 items, 1-5 point scale); (ii) Non-harsh discipline (4 items, 1-5 point scale); (iii) Mindfulness (awareness of own actions and consideration of student's situations when interacting or disciplining students) (10 items, 1-4 point scale); (iv) Emotion socialization-supporting negative emotion (practice used to support students in managing negative emotions) (6 items, 1-5 point scale); (v) Family engagement (frequency in interacting with families) (2 items, 1-5 point scale); and (vi) Teacher-Student Interaction (5 items, 1-5 point scale). The final score is a mean composite of these six measures and ranges from 1-5; where higher scores indicate greater use of EBI practices.
Month 18
Teacher Stress Score
Time Frame: Baseline
Teacher Stress was assessed using four measures: (i) Work Burnout (level of emotional and physical exhaustion from work) (9 items, 1-7 point scale), (ii) Family Stress (relationship stress) (5 items, 1-4 point scale); (iii) Kessler Psychological Distress Scale (K10) (anxiety and depressive symptoms) (10 items, 1-5 point scale); and (iv) Organization/ School Staff Stress (teachers' perception of level of stress in school) (5 items, 1-5 point scale). The total score is a mean composite of these four measures and ranges from 1-5; higher scores indicate higher stress levels.
Baseline
Teacher Stress Score
Time Frame: Month 6
Teacher Stress was assessed using four measures: (i) Work Burnout (level of emotional and physical exhaustion from work) (9 items, 1-7 point scale), (ii) Family Stress (relationship stress) (5 items, 1-4 point scale); (iii) Kessler Psychological Distress Scale (K10) (anxiety and depressive symptoms) (10 items, 1-5 point scale); and (iv) Organization/ School Staff Stress (teachers' perception of level of stress in school) (5 items, 1-5 point scale). The total score is a mean composite of these four measures and ranges from 1-5; higher scores indicate higher stress levels.
Month 6
Teacher Stress Score
Time Frame: Month 18
Teacher Stress was assessed using four measures: (i) Work Burnout (level of emotional and physical exhaustion from work) (9 items, 1-7 point scale), (ii) Family Stress (relationship stress) (5 items, 1-4 point scale); (iii) Kessler Psychological Distress Scale (K10) (anxiety and depressive symptoms) (10 items, 1-5 point scale); and (iv) Organization/ School Staff Stress (teachers' perception of level of stress in school) (5 items, 1-5 point scale). The total score is a mean composite of these four measures and ranges from 1-5; higher scores indicate higher stress levels.
Month 18
Teacher Stress Management
Time Frame: Baseline
Teacher Stress Management was assessed using four measures: (i) Cognitive regulation (ability to redirect negative thinking to positive thinking when distressed) (3 items, 1-5 point scale); (ii) Emotion Expression (ability to express emotion) (4 items, 1-5 point scale); (iii) Emotion Acceptance (ability to accept negative emotion) (3 items, 1-5 point scale); and (iv) Support from Work (getting support from school staff) (5 items, 1-5 point scale). The total score is a mean composite of these four measures and ranges from 1-5; higher scores indicate greater management of stress.
Baseline
Teacher Stress Management
Time Frame: Month 6
Teacher Stress Management was assessed using four measures: (i) Cognitive regulation (ability to redirect negative thinking to positive thinking when distressed) (3 items, 1-5 point scale); (ii) Emotion Expression (ability to express emotion) (4 items, 1-5 point scale); (iii) Emotion Acceptance (ability to accept negative emotion) (3 items, 1-5 point scale); and (iv) Support from Work (getting support from school staff) (5 items, 1-5 point scale). The total score is a mean composite of these four measures and ranges from 1-5; higher scores indicate greater management of stress.
Month 6
Teacher Stress Management
Time Frame: Month 18
Teacher Stress Management was assessed using four measures: (i) Cognitive regulation (ability to redirect negative thinking to positive thinking when distressed) (3 items, 1-5 point scale); (ii) Emotion Expression (ability to express emotion) (4 items, 1-5 point scale); (iii) Emotion Acceptance (ability to accept negative emotion) (3 items, 1-5 point scale); and (iv) Support from Work (getting support from school staff) (5 items, 1-5 point scale). The total score is a mean composite of these four measures and ranges from 1-5; higher scores indicate greater management of stress.
Month 18

Secondary Outcome Measures

Secondary Outcome Measures

In a clinical study's protocol, a planned outcome measure that is not as important as the primary outcome measure for evaluating the effect of an intervention but is still of interest. Most clinical studies have more than one secondary outcome measure.
Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Child Mental Health- Conduct Problem
Time Frame: Baseline
Conduct problem items (5 items) from the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) are rated by parents, which assesses child's conduct and non-compliant behaviors over the last six months. Each item is rated on a Likert scale from 0 (not true) to 2 (certainly true). The total score is the sum of responses and ranges from 0-10; higher scores indicate greater difficulties.
Baseline
Child Mental Health- Conduct Problem
Time Frame: Month 6
Conduct problem items (5 items) from the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) are rated by parents, which assesses child's conduct and non-compliant behaviors over the last six months. Each item is rated on a Likert scale from 0 (not true) to 2 (certainly true). The total score is the sum of responses and ranges from 0-10; higher scores indicate greater difficulties.
Month 6
Child Mental Health- Conduct Problem
Time Frame: Month 18
Conduct problem items (5 items) from the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) are rated by parents, which assesses child's conduct and non-compliant behaviors over the last six months. Each item is rated on a Likert scale from 0 (not true) to 2 (certainly true). The total score is the sum of responses and ranges from 0-10; higher scores indicate greater difficulties.
Month 18

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Sponsor

Sponsor

The organization or person who initiates the study and who has authority and control over the study.
NYU Langone Health

Investigators

Investigators

A researcher involved in a clinical study. Related terms include site principal investigator, site sub-investigator, study chair, study director, and study principal investigator.
  • Principal Investigator: Keng-Yen Huang, MD, MPH, NYU Langone Health

Publications and helpful links

The person responsible for entering information about the study voluntarily provides these publications. These may be about anything related to the study.

General Publications

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start (Actual)

Study Start

The actual date on which the first participant was enrolled in a clinical study. The "anticipated" study start date is the date that the researchers think will be the study start date.
August 1, 2021

Primary Completion (Actual)

Primary Completion

The date on which the last participant in a clinical study was examined or received an intervention to collect final data for the primary outcome measure. Whether the clinical study ended according to the protocol or was terminated does not affect this date. For clinical studies with more than one primary outcome measure with different completion dates, this term refers to the date on which data collection is completed for all the primary outcome measures. The "anticipated" primary completion date is the date that the researchers think will be the primary completion date for the study.
June 30, 2024

Study Completion (Actual)

Study Completion

The date on which the last participant in a clinical study was examined or received an intervention/treatment to collect final data for the primary outcome measures, secondary outcome measures, and adverse events (that is, the last participant's last visit). The "anticipated" study completion date is the date that the researchers think will be the study completion date.
February 28, 2025

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

First Submitted

The date on which the study sponsor or investigator first submitted a study record to ClinicalTrials.gov. There is typically a delay of a few days between the first submitted date and the record's availability on ClinicalTrials.gov (the first posted date).
April 16, 2020

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

The date on which the study sponsor or investigator first submits a study record that is consistent with National Library of Medicine (NLM) quality control (QC) review criteria. The sponsor or investigator may need to revise and submit a study record one or more times before NLM's QC review criteria are met. It is the responsibility of the sponsor or investigator to ensure that the study record is consistent with the NLM QC review criteria.
May 7, 2020

First Posted (Actual)

First Posted

The date on which the study record was first available on ClinicalTrials.gov after National Library of Medicine (NLM) quality control (QC) review has concluded. There is typically a delay of a few days between the date the study sponsor or investigator submitted the study record and the first posted date.
May 12, 2020

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Actual)

Last Update Posted

The most recent date on which changes to a study record were made available on ClinicalTrials.gov. There may be a delay between when the changes were submitted to ClinicalTrials.gov by the study's sponsor or investigator (the last update submitted date) and the last update posted date.
September 14, 2026

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

The most recent date on which the study sponsor or investigator submitted changes to a study record that are consistent with National Library of Medicine (NLM) quality control (QC) review criteria. It is the responsibility of the sponsor or investigator to ensure that the study record is consistent with the NLM QC review criteria.
August 17, 2026

Last Verified

Last Verified

The most recent date on which the study sponsor or investigator confirmed the information about a clinical study on ClinicalTrials.gov as accurate and current. If a study with a recruitment status of recruiting; not yet recruiting; or active, not recruiting has not been confirmed within the past 2 years, the study's recruitment status is shown as unknown.
August 1, 2026

More Information

Terms related to this study

Other Study ID Numbers

Other Study ID Numbers

Identifiers or ID numbers other than the NCT number that are assigned to a clinical study by the study's sponsor, funders, or others. These numbers may include unique identifiers from other trial registries and National Institutes of Health grant numbers.
  • 20-00117

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?

YES

IPD Plan Description

The de-identified participant data from the final research datasets (defined below) will be shared via the National Databased of Clinical Trials (NDCT) related to Mental Illness. The proposed cluster RCT study will be carried out in Uganda. It will collect data on 540 school staff (i.e., teachers), and 1,980 parent-child pairs from 36 schools. Child and teacher/school effectiveness outcome data and demographic data collected from teachers, schools, and families across all three assessment time points will be released for sharing. In addition, implementation context data will also be released. These data will be share via the NDCT related to Mental Illness. Implementation fidelity data will not be shared through NDCT, but can be requested from the PI Keng-Yen Huang directly beginning 9 months following article publication or at the end of the study.

IPD Sharing Time Frame

Analyzed data file and final trial data will be share at the end of the study via the National Databased of Clinical Trials (NDCT) related to Mental Illness (the NIMH recommended format). There will be no end date for data sharing.

IPD Sharing Access Criteria

Requests should be directed to PI Keng-Yen Huang at huangk01@nyulangone.org. To gain access, data requestors will need to sign a data access agreement.

IPD Sharing Supporting Information Type

  • STUDY_PROTOCOL
  • SAP

Drug and device information, study documents

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product

No

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product

No

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

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