South Carolina Health and Human Services Director Robert Kerr is looking to raise insurance reimbursement rates for in-school therapists, in the hopes that it enables districts to hire more counselors, The State reported May 9.
A state audit found the number of mental health clinicians in South Carolina schools inadequate to meet students' needs, the report said. The audit recommended the state augment and restructure its school mental health program.
The state's Department of Mental Health has lost more than 25 percent of its school-based mental health workers since 2020, the report said. The department now serves 214 fewer schools than it did in 2020.
Mr. Kerr said the state's current ratio of one mental health counselor for every 1,300 public school students is "woefully inadequate," according to the report.
South Carolina's Medicaid reimbursement rate pays school districts and private providers less than half what it pays the Department of Mental Health for identical services provided by its clinicians, the report said. The disparate rates are an obstacle to schools bolstering their counseling services.
Mr. Kerr is planning to raise those lower rates on July 1.