This Act updates federal law to include area career and technical education schools alongside institutions of higher education when providing mental health and substance use disorder services.
Nicholas Langworthy
Representative
NY-23
The CTE Student Mental Health and Wellness Act updates federal law to expand mental health and substance use disorder services to include area career and technical education (CTE) schools alongside traditional institutions of higher education. This is achieved by replacing the term "institution of higher education" with the broader term "covered institution" throughout relevant sections of the Public Health Service Act. Essentially, the bill broadens the scope of federal support for student mental health programs to cover CTE students.
CTE Student Mental Health Act Expands Federal Support to Technical Schools, Not Just Colleges
This bill, officially the CTE Student Mental Health and Wellness Act, is making a necessary but technical change to how the federal government handles mental health services for students. It’s essentially a terminology update with a huge real-world payoff for vocational students.
The Paperwork That Matters: Updating the Law
Section 2 of the bill focuses on Section 520E2 of the Public Health Service Act, which governs federal support for student mental health and substance use disorder services. Previously, this section primarily referred to "institution of higher education." The new legislation swaps this term out for the new, broader phrase, “covered institution,” throughout subsections (a) through (f).
This isn't just bureaucratic wordplay. The key move is in subsection (g), where the bill defines "covered institution" to mean two things: an institution of higher education and an area career and technical education school. This means that technical schools—places like trade schools, vocational centers, and community college programs focused on specific careers like welding, nursing, or HVAC repair—are now explicitly included under the umbrella of schools eligible for these federal mental health programs.
Why This Matters for Students
Think about the student who is getting certified as an electrician at a technical school. Before this change, their school might have been on shaky legal ground when applying for federal funding aimed at student mental health services, because the law didn't clearly include them. This bill fixes that oversight.
By explicitly including “area career and technical education schools,” the law ensures that students in high-pressure, fast-track vocational programs get the same access to counseling and substance use resources as students pursuing a four-year degree. The student juggling a full-time job while learning a trade, or the single parent retraining for a new career, often faces intense stress. This change ensures that the federal programs designed to help students cope with those pressures are available everywhere they should be. It’s a simple definition change that translates directly into better support for a huge segment of the future workforce.