Kristen Amerson Youth Foundation: A Case Study

In the United States, suicide is the third leading cause of death among persons between the ages of 10-24 [1]. In addition, a large percentage of adolescents consider committing suicide. The Centers for Disease Control found that 16% of students in high schools nationwide reported seriously considering suicide, while 8 percent reported trying to take their own life [1]. One of the difficulties in addressing the issue of suicide is the stigma attached to it. People are unwilling to discuss it publically. [1]

In American society there are children and adolescents who commit suicide and it has become a major concern. According to the world health organization, suicide is the second or third cause of death among young people in many countries worldwide among those 10 to 14 years old and the second leading cause of death among 15 to 24 years old, stated from CDC/NCHS in 2011. Suicide must be prevented. There are three articles that show us the study of how school programs and connectedness can prevent suicide from occurring. Article one called “Connectedness and Suicide prevention in Adolescents: Pathways and Implication” by the Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior from the American Association of Suicidology. Article two “Preventing Child Suicide: The Elementary School Death Education Puppet Show” by G.R. Bernhardt and Susan G. Praeger. Article three “Suicide prevention in adolescents: a controlled study of the effectiveness of a school-based psycho-educational program” by Gwendolyn Portzky and Kees Heeringen.

Suicide has been rising at alarming rates; the overall suicide rate for children and adolescents has increased over 300% since the 1950s. (Miller, 2009) Adolescent children are screaming out for our help, are we just ignoring the signs or do we not care? For young people, an average 1,800 take their own lives and 85,000 are hospitalized for attempts nationally (CDC, 2008). With this kind of statistics we need to step in and take some action.

Good friendships gained in school will last long past graduation day. People never think it would be their friend they lose to suicide, it happens. Everyone likes to push it aside and not talk about it but communicating with others can make a difference. That is exactly how Ben Finnie felt when his cousin named Kaleigh Finnie ended her own life as a college student. A daily national morning talk show also known as The Today Show interviewed Ben about his way of spreading the word about suicide prevention. Ben is addressing this issue by working among more than two thousand high school and college students through the Direct Change program in California by creating sixty second public service announcements videos to raise awareness about mental illness and suicide. (Stump 2016) Jana Sczersputowski, the founder and project director for Directing Change Program told TODAY, “Over the past four years we have received countless stories from youth and teachers who have shared how our program has opened up conversations in the classroom, home and between friends.” (Stump 2016) Finnie shared with the talk show, “I do not care whether it is one person or thousands of people, the simple facts that is could save a life, that is all that really matters.” (Stump

From experts on this issue, to the civilians in the public, it is expressed deeply that suicide should not be hidden from any person, including children. It is said that, ¨Each day in our nation there are an average of over 5,400 attempts by young people grades 7-12,¨ (The Parent Resource Program). The thought of a lovely girl named AnnMarie Blaha may come into mind, who took her life in 2013, and was a fifth grader at Meadow Ridge. Nothing can compare to the tragedy of why AnnMarie decided to commit suicide, and the sadness that overwhelmed the school districts was unbearable. From learning about AnnMarie’s story, it can show that like most parents of children who commit suicide, AnnMarie’s parents who had no idea of their daughter’s unknown situation. I confronted my parents, asking them certain questions dealing with this difficult topic. The first question I asked was, “Do you know where to go if you believe your child is thinking of suicide?” Unfortunately, neither one of my parents were able to answer question, because like parents of suicidal children, the thought has never crossed their minds. Since AnnMarie’s death, the importance of educating children and teens of suicide has grown tremendously, and a Prevention Law called, ¨AnnMaries Law,¨ was signed by Governor Bruce Rauner to require ¨the Illinois State Board Education and local school boards to create policies ensuring that students receive age-appropriate lessons youth suicide and prevention¨ (Chicago Tribune). Multiple websites describe the traumatizing death of AnnMarie, but one in particular called, ¨AnnMarie’s Foundation, A Life to Remember,¨ provides resources, hotlines, facts, and notifies the community of warning signals that may be given off by any person. The raise in education is highly needed in all communities. In

One evidence-based intervention is designed by Screening for Mental Health [SMH], the program is called Signs of Suicide [SOS]. The Signs of Suicide program is an award winning program and it is also a nationally recognized program (). The Signs of Suicide program is designed for youth of various ages ranging from middle school and the way to high school (). This program helps students learn how to point out signs of depression and suicide in themselves or in their friends or family. This program recognizes the emotional distress that often follows the aftermath of a completed suicide. Suicide, according to the Signs of Suicide Program is both recognizable and treatable. A well-designed prevention program can educate the youth on how to spot the warning signs of depression, in people they love. The Signs of Suicide Program provides everyday risk management tools and information to judge, prevent and respond to signs of suicide ().

The next educational effort would be the students at all schools with the focus on “health risks and nutrition and knowing what suicide looks like” in your friends or family. During education, the health maintenance and grief resource center would be initiated with location information given to all clinics, dentists, mental health counselors, schools, local hospitals, and churches. This approach to community assessment allows the PHN the understanding of historical trauma, sociocultural, and economic contexts and meaning to create partnerships with individuals, families, groups and communities promoting improved overall health and mental health (Stanhope & Lancaster, 2016). The focus of this program would center around Lake County Montana with adolescent and younger children at the forefront. Outreach, follow-up, and counseling is an impediment to improvement and stabilization for the mental health individual, which could be a risk factor for suicide and other health-related concerns. To assist with this goal, a grant will be required to cover financial needs. For example, The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention’s Research Grants awards monies from 30,000 to 1.5 million for suicide prevention, in 2015 they awarded 17 grantees for studies and programs to prevent suicide (afsp.org). These dollars will assist

Statistics show suicide to be the third leading cause of death among 13-19 year olds, with approximately 6000 suicide deaths each year (Dickinson 1999). Because of statistics like this, the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) researchers are vying to find interventions to help prevent suicide among children and adolescents. However, until then, the best prevention appears to lie in early diagnosis

Schools are a cost-effective way to reach youth, yet there is no conclusive evidence regarding the most effective prevention strategy. We conducted a systematic review of the empirical literature on school-based suicide prevention programs. Signs of Suicide and the Good Behavior Game were the only programs found to reduce suicide attempts. There are few evidence-based, school-based suicide prevention programs, a combination of which may be effective. It would be useful to evaluate the effectiveness of general mental health promotion programs on the outcome of suicide (Katz et al.,

American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. (2016). A model school policy on suicide prevention: Model language, commentary, and resources. Retrieved from:

Because teen suicide is the 2nd leading cause of death for Idahoans age 15-34 and specifically for males age 10-14 this program will be directly targeted to children, both male and female aged 10-17, (5th-12th grades). The specific behavior that will be targeted is bullying.

The structure of our program is to work with school sites in order to train a core group of students on how to identify the risk factors and warning signs of suicide. The goal is for the students to ultimately be a link to a trusted adult or resource on campus for a student who may be contemplating suicide. Once students are trained we work with them to create schoolwide campaigns which focus on raising awareness to help resources that are always available when needed.

High School Pre-Survey: Introduction-The questions in this survey are about your awareness of suicide prevention efforts on your campus. Your responses are anonymous. This means your information will remain private and your answers will not be shared with others. If there is a question that you may not want to answer, you may skip it:

As people can tell, there are many different interventions methods for people considering suicide, but does not mean that each of those interventions are the best. Suicide intervention and prevention programs that are school based are difficult to determine the effectiveness because of the lack of evidence. Research has noted that there are some reasons as to why school based suicide intervention does work. Those reasons were provided in a table from an article by Balaguru, Sharma, and Waheed. Balaguru, Sharma, and Waheed ( 20102, p 134) discovered that school based programs can be effective because they involve parents in the process, addresses the risk factor of drinking alcohol and how it correlates with suicide, improves problem solving

Day to day, teens suffer from peer pressure, problem from home, and stress from academics. Despise their status in the environment, majority of high school students refrain from acknowledging the presence of their reality. The problem in most situations in that students feel shut in, trapped in a never ending misery. How do they cope? What are their ways of dealing? Most students live in denial. Others have friends to confide in. For the devastating part, most students are not as open to these ideas and it leaves them with this alternative: suicide. Suicide is the third leading cause in teens the ages 14 to 19 within rural underserved areas. Suicidal ideation (SI), suicidal thoughts, were surveyed in over 12 high schools and it was found that in the past year, thoughts of (SI) were not shared with peers or even adults in the pursuit of receiving help or support (Pisani, 2012). Because a student spends most of their day at school, it is ideal for schools to provide realistic opportunities and school-based programs to assist with the suicide among the youth. The Surviving the Teens Suicide Prevention and Depression Awareness Program designed four 50 minute session or each high school student. This presented information in regards to factual information about depression, suicidal warning signs, suicidal risk factors and myths associated with suicide (King, 2010). The program provide coping strategies for everyday life, referral sources if feeling suicidal, and how to recognize