HISTORY OF BRYT

WELCOME T0 BRYT: BRIDGE FOR RESILIENT YOUTH IN TRANSITION

Partnering with schools and families to promote healing, wellness, and academic success for teens returning from prolonged absences.

One in every five U.S. adolescents has a serious mental health condition and 10 percent will experience extended absences from school. For these students, school re-entry can be overwhelming, fraught with problems including depression, anxiety, and fear of social rejection. These youth disproportionately struggle, attempt suicide, abuse alcohol and drugs, and function poorly at home, in the classroom, and among friends. They are at high risk for academic failure and their families are often in crisis, as well. The challenge of recovery while managing typical adolescent social and academic pressures can lead to a high rate of relapse. Up to half of students with serious mental health disorders drop out of high school.

Bridge for Resilient Youth in Transition (BRYT, pronounced “bright”) is changing that reality. Its pioneering model of innovative school bridge programs equips schools to provide short-term intervention, improve student outcomes, get 85% or more of students back to their regular academic schedule, and bring dropout rates down to as low as 8%.

Each BRYT program approaches staffing, space, and services with a consistent vision, while customizing the specifics for each school population and for each student. Dating back to the establishment of the original BRYT Program in 2004 at Brookline High School, the rapidly-growing BRYT Network now includes 137 schools collectively enrolling 140,000 students. The Brookline Center for Community Mental Health created and continues to manage and grow BRYT. Generating clear benefits to schools and families, BRYT strives to become a standard best practice throughout Massachusetts and, ultimately, across the country.

To learn more about the BRYT program, click on the link below.