124th Morrison Congress

2nd Session

S. 124-0
Title of the Bill:

Mental Health Days

Main Author(s):

Melody McCrary

Co-Sponsor(s):
BE IT ENACTED BY THE MORRISON CONGRESS
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38

SECTION 1: Findings
Congress makes the following findings:
1) Average number of school days in a year is 180 (II)
2) 31% of teens reported feeling overwhelmed
3) 30% reported feeling sad or depressed, as a result of their stress
4) 36% of teens report feeling tired
5) 23% report skipping a meal due to stress (III)
6) Benefits (IV)
a) Reduce stress
b) Enhance your mental stimulation
c) Increase productivity
d) Tackle your personal to-do list
e) Get better quality sleep
f) Feel revitalized

SECTION 2: Purpose
If a student has a severe mental illness, schools should give the student 10 mental
health days per semester so that they can recover. All other students should
receive 5 mental health days per semester. Students need to work when they
are at their best and if they are given the option of mental health it will motivate
them.
SECTION 3: General Provisions
School should be extended from 180 to 183 so that students will not feel that they
are missing a ton of school from taking a mental health day (MHD). Because
students are feeling overwhelmed, sad or depressed, tired, and/or skipping a
meal because of stress they should be allotted time to take a MHD to rewind and
relax. Benefits to taking a MHD are Reduce stress, Enhance your mental
stimulation, Increase productivity, Tackle your personal to-do list, Get better
quality sleep, and Feel revitalized. If a student is very stressed theyll either do
one of two things- over work, and not work at all; both of which are not good for
them. So, if they can take a day or two just to do nothing or work on everything
they need to without pressure, then they will be able to come back to class
revitalized and better. Students diagnosed with a mental illness should receive
10 days because sometimes they cannot physically do what they need to do. If
they are given days and not penalized for not going to school, they will also not
receive the stress of not going to school.

39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70

Each public school should be given $10,000 to cover the cost of increasing the
school year and for flexibility with MHD.

SECTION 4: Definitions
A mental health day is exactly what it sounds likea short break (usually 1-2 days)
where you decompress (I).

Works Cited:
I.
http://www.ahealthiermichigan.org/2015/04/22/mental-health-day-benefits/
II.
https://nces.ed.gov/surveys/sass/tables/sass0708_035_s1s.asp
III.
https://www.teenhelp.com/stress-anxiety/teen-stress-statistics/
IV.
https://vantagepointrecovery.com/6-benefits-taking-mental-health-day/
V.