Dear Colleague Letter on Social-Emotional Development and Mental Health

On June 14, the Departments of Health and Human (HHS) and Education (ED) issued a Dear Colleague Letter and four recommendations to state, territorial, tribal, and local policymakers and administrators of systems, agencies, and programs responsible for young children’s health and well-being, social-emotional development, and early learning. These recommendations and action steps are intended to help early childhood systems work collaboratively to ensure that young children and their caregivers have access to high-quality resources that equitably support social-emotional development and mental health. The Dear Colleague Letter also includes links to various resources available to support this work.

The Administration for Children and Families also worked with federal partners to develop a series of short videos to highlight the recommendations from the letter. The videos spotlight important issues such as caring for caregivers, both parents and early care and education providers, and systemic supports essential for supporting young children’s mental health and well-being. The first video spotlights the importance of integrating support for the social emotional development of young children and the well-being of their caregivers into all child- and family-serving programs. View the video .  Other videos will be released over the summer.

This is part of our ongoing work across the federal government to address mental health needs of children and their families. President Biden announced his whole-of-government strategy to address our national mental health crisis as part of the Unity Agenda in March 2022. Addressing mental health, especially in children and youth, is a priority at HHS. On May 25, 2022, leaders across HHS released a joint letter on supporting the mental health needs of children , which features early childhood mental health supports.