This fall, The NAN Project presented in a few new schools, returned to past schools, and continued expanding our work with middle schools and universities. As we prepare for a new year and some busy months ahead, we can’t believe how much we’ve done in 2019! 

As of this December, The NAN Project has reached over 9,000 students with our Peer Mentor Presentations or other suicide prevention training! Our team of Peer Mentors have traveled all across the state this fall, presenting in:  Harvard, Salem, Melrose, Stoneham, Billerica, Medway, Plymouth, Milford, Hopedale, Somerville, Chelsea, Andover, Lowell, Tyngsborough, and Lawrence!   Our team has returned to Phillips Academy, The Bromfield School, Milford, Greater Lowell Technical, and Andover High School to present comeback stories of resiliency to this year’s health classes! We’ve also began the school year with some new connections at Methuen and Melrose High School, and traveled south to begin work with Medway High School, Hopedale High School and MAP Academy in Plymouth. For a more in-depth article on our last visit to Lowell High School, read Sarah ’s article on the NAN Line Blog!

Not only have we done our typical presentation to schools, we’ve also provided trainings for faculty and some Peer Leadership students to provide them with more knowledge and skills related to mental health and how to help someone who is struggling. We have provided a non-clinical suicide prevention training to schools called, Question, Persuade, Refer or “QPR” to staff and students, in hopes that it will give them more confidence in finding students help when they need it. QPR is a training that teaches someone how to ask a person if they are thinking of suicide, give tips and tools on ways to help persuade the person struggling, and lastly bringing the person to the right support. We also trained Melrose High School’s faculty in Mental Health 101, which is a training Donna Kausek, our Clinical Director has recently offered to staff in schools. This training provides an overview of basic mental health challenges commonly seen in the classroom. 

We have returned this fall to speak to the 7th and 8th graders over at Bromfield Middle School in Harvard. Our set up for middle schools are a little different from our regular curriculum, as we want middle schoolers to know and recognize the signs of different mental health disorders, and how to help themselves or a friend if they’re struggling.  We adjusted the language we use to cater to the younger audience and made the program a bit more interactive to keep the kids moving. We also provide lots of candy!

Our founder, Ellen Dalton, Executive Director Jake Cavanaugh and Peer Coordinator Elli Peltola were featured on WCVB Channel 5 Boston’s nightly “5 for Good” segment, which covers people and organizations around Massachusetts that do uplifting work.! To read more, check out our article here.

We also held two Peer Mentor trainings in Salem and Lawrence where we trained 9 new young adults. These amazing youth learned how to tell their stories of resiliency and strength, while also undergoing QPR suicide prevention training and picking up skills to help them engage students in the classroom on the difficult topic of mental health.

None of these events could have happened without our incredible team of Peer Mentors! Thank you all for your continued efforts to bring your stories to classrooms across the state. If you’re wondering what our team will do over the cold months– we’ll be hosting more Peer Mentor trainings and continuing to spread the word about mental health! Check out our Peer Mentor Spotlight to learn more about these incredible individuals.