Oneflew:
There are psych wards in hospitals both private and university, and there are mental health nurses working in them as MH nurses (with the specific skills that MH nurses have). MH care is also provided in VA hospitals and county/public hospitals. Retreat style MH care would be very rare. Afaik, MH nurses would not work in counselling unless they had a specific qualification in counselling - counselling psychologist or LSW/MSW for instance - on top of the nursing qualification. You might have to take exams to qualify you in any given state, and you would almost certainly have to submit your transcript to a state professional accreditation board or equivalent. There are a lot of nursing temp and recruitment agencies who would be able to advise, as well as a state professional board -- loads of nurses in all areas of practice come from places outside the US ime.
I never saw a nurse with long decorative nails but hair was rarely tied back and no medical staff or nursing staff wore anything but scrubs in any hospital or doctor office I have ever been to, with the exception of my midwife and the DCs' pediatricians so nobody really had a collar. I have encountered lab tech people and phlebotomists with amazing nails..
The gravy is like white sauce with sausage pan scrapings. It's made with milk, sausage fat and bits and flour. It's not gravy as in Sunday roast.
Ime teaching is a respected profession, but some teachers are more respected than others iykwim. Starting HS salary in the public HS here is about $60k. Thanks to the way the state sees things, a gym teacher is worth as much as a maths teacher, so a teacher who teaches driver's ed and freshman core PE who has a good few years under his belt can make $150K with a hefty bonus on top of that for coaching a sport, with a pension upon retirement. Teachers in my district are paid a decent bonus for running an after school club or coaching a sport. As a result there are loads of after school clubs and no shortage of coaches. In RC schools pay is a bit less afaik.
My mum would call biscuits savoury (she would call them scones too, rhyming with 'gone' 
) whereas she would call strawberry shortcake sweet. Anything without sugar added in the recipe was savoury in her book. It wouldn't require spice or herbs or the addition of cheese.
I have just this morning hauled DD4 and all her school supplies to school. We passed a lot of children walking. We fished her art and writing supply box out of the back of the car along with her locker shelves, where they have lain all summer along with DS's surplus stuff from university. Her new notebooks, and the composition books that I originally bought for DD3 several years ago and that I know from experience won't be used were in her backpack. She had her paper towels and plastic zip bags (all dollar store variety) in the shopping bags they came home in, i.e. dollar store bags, along with everyone else by the looks of things. I didn't bother with the antibac wipes or tissues. She has all her old markers and coloured pencils and crayons, etc. I will send tissues when cold season starts. Everybody gathered outside the school was equally weighed down. She got her textbooks today but they are now in her locker. Most of them will only be used for class work as there is an online version of everything. I rarely sent them with all the extra classroom supplies every year as I know they have a huge stash in a storeroom in the basement to cover any classroom shortfall (oh the joys of having a preschool TA as a friend ).
A friend of mine taught in a very low income neighbourhood school and provided cheap hats for his students. The hats came out of his own pocket but classroom school supplies were budgeted for by the school. Extras like cleaning supplies were also provided as it was a public school. He learned never to assign homework that involved colouring. He also ended up topping up the classroom supplies himself a few times every year. Funny enough, RC schools that serve poor neighbourhoods generally find they can make do with far fewer school supplies than the DCs' school requires...
In this neck of the woods, sports are really popular but so are the arts and also good old fashioned doing very little and amusing yourself. A huge number of children do soccer from age 3 (AYSO-organised leagues and travel teams), T ball, volleyball, baseball, softball, basketball (travel teams for all four beginning with 11/12 year olds). Travel team membership is by tryout and competition for a spot on a team roster is fierce. There is also lacrosse, field hockey, competitive club swimming, football (Little League), club and municipal gymnastics, and there is a huge dance subset. All the high schools offer summer camps for children from 12 upwards in a lot of sports. On top of that, there are lots of martial arts studios. The parents you see with their children in every sport going tend to be Irish... There are a lot of music kids (from School of Rock to classical) and a really good local children's choir that holds auditions. The local small theatre also does drama camps. There is a lot of overlap among interests.