What is STEER?

We know how much young people today care about mental health. Perhaps you’ve struggled yourself or know someone struggling right now.  In 2012 Dr Simon and Dr Jo Walker realised that more and more teenagers were finding life a challenge, but weren’t getting the support they needed early enough.  They understood that it wasn’t always easy for students to talk to their teachers, and it wasn’t always easy for teachers to know their students needed support.  They founded STEER to help. 

Simon and Jo developed a new type of assessment process that could help teachers understand how their students were navigating school at the moment, without asking private questions that students may not feel comfortable answering. 

Simon and Jo also understood that teenagers cope with a lot of change as they grow up, so it was likely that their responses to an assessment would change too. That’s why they developed an assessment tool that measured how students were changing over time, rather than labelled them in a one off assessment. Noticing changes in their students’ data would help teachers know which students needed their help and how to provide it. 

So really - STEER is about helping your teachers know you better, so they can give you the right support at the right time.