FARMINGTON—It can be tough for children in a military family to fit in and get the support they need when they’re moving from place to place and constantly trying to make new friends while keeping up with school work. The Davis School District has formed the Military Support Team to help families make those transitions. April is Month of the Military Child, a time for the community to come together and support them.

“We are the first of its kind,” said Francesca Suarez, MPsych.

Military Support Program Lead for Davis School District. “We were created four years ago through some connections between the Utah Department of Veterans and Military Affairs (UDVMA) and Hill Air Force Base (HAFB).”

The deputy director of UDVMA was at a town hall on HAFB back in 2021, she said. “Some military families were voicing concerns regarding some gaps in services. We’re such a transient demographic and population where sometimes our kids' academics don’t flow the way we hope they would.”

Not all curriculums match up from state to state, let alone country to country, Suarez said. “So some of the families were voicing that special education, IEPs and 504s were going through some challenges where accommodations didn't line up and resources and services for their kids were not being met.”

UDVMA had some money from legislation and they reached out to Davis School District, she said. “The reason the district was chosen is because we sit dead in the middle of HAFB which is the second largest Air Force Base in the nation and they do have a large population there with federal civilians being there.”

That makes up a really big population of retirees and veterans, said Suarez. “Then there are 5,000 active duty families that are stationed at that base. So with Davis School District’s student and family resources department they created and hired some of us who are experts in the areas of helping military families.”

The team currently consists of military educational therapists, military family advocates and a behavior specialist, she said. “We all do wraparound services for military connected students for the district. That connection can look like an active duty guard, reserve veteran or retired status military family.”

Suarez said there are several different ways they get referrals. “We implemented a military student identifier form in the district after our team was established so that we could track military connected students.”

Inside the system that the support team uses for student profiles, there's a purple flag that’s labeled military for any family that has self identified themselves as being military connected, she said. “We have 5,000 students in our district. Every single one of those parents and guardians received the email and we asked them to fill it out if they were military. It tells us on the education side with access to those records that we are dealing with a military connected student and their family.”

They also receive referrals from their partners, our school liaison program managers on HAFB, said Suarez. “Oftentimes military families will go to visit them on the installations and ask for support and resources or maybe notify them of some challenges. Those managers then reach out to the Military Support Team.”

Suarez said they receive a form that they read through to determine what services the students may need. “We call a parent. We call a school counselor, we call administration if there’s additional information that’s needed. Then we kind of put together a small plan on how we are going to provide wraparound services.”

Sometimes they staff them with a military educational therapist on the team, she said. “Then they get anywhere from eight to 10 brief therapeutic sessions in the school setting. Maybe it’s not that long of a term that’s needed. Maybe it’s only three or four sessions. That’s what we call stabilization. It all depends on the need. We do get consent. That’s one of our legal requirements. So we get consent from the parents and then move forward.”

Sometimes therapy is not needed and it’s just resource support, said Suarez. “Maybe they’re struggling with food insecurity or they need rental assistance.”

The Military Support Team just won Best of State for support personnel in the state of Utah, she said. “We have some other states reaching out to us to do their best in mirroring our program. You know, military connected families and students all over the nation could really benefit from a good program that provides wraparound care.”