Grantee Types: Garrett Lee Smith Campus

National-Louis University, a broad-access institution in Chicago, proposes NLU-SPI, a suicide prevention approach in which a network of internal and external partners will develop a university-wide process for responding to students’ mental health needs; oversee training for staff and students; implement social media and other outreach to increase awareness of services; and increase knowledge of how to understand and respond to the impact of adverse childhood experiences (ACES). The project will focus on three vulnerable populations: an undergraduate program designed specifically for first-generation, predominately low-income students; veterans and military-connected family members; and young adults with intellectual and multiple emotional disabilities. Over 1,500 primarily African-American and Hispanic students will be served annually, for a total of 4,500 students over the three years of the project. The six project goals are:

• Goal 1: Create a comprehensive infrastructure and collaborative network of internal and external partners that will establish a proactive and cohesive plan to monitor and respond to student mental health needs;
• Goal 2: Implement a comprehensive training program to increase student, faculty and staff capacity to recognize and effectively respond to warning signs of self-harm, suicidality, and substance abuse in others;
• Goal 3: Increase student knowledge of mental and substance use disorder services by developing a student outreach plan focusing on the three target populations;
• Goal 4: Increase student access to voluntary mental and substance use disorder screenings and assessments;
• Goal 5:Increase student knowledge of the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline (TALK) as well as others other relevant lifelines;
• Goal 6: Create a Trauma Informed culture that starts with an understanding of the life-long impact of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs). The impact objectives focus on increasing faculty, staff and student knowledge and changing responses to mental health needs:
• By Y3/Q4 faculty, staff and students will show a 20% increase over Y1 baseline in knowledge about how to recognize and effectively respond to warning signs of self-harm, suicidality, and substance abuse in others;
• By the end of Y3/Q4 there will be a 20% increase over Y1 baseline in faculty and staff reporting on student mental health needs;
• By the end of Y3/Q4 students will show a 20% increase over Y1 baseline in knowledge about mental and substance use disorder services as measured by SPEAKS survey, designed for GLS campuses.
• By Y2/Q4, students will show a 25% increase over Y1 baseline data in participating in voluntary mental and substance use disorder screenings and assessments

The MSU It Takes a Community initiative is a new multidisciplinary program at Mississippi State University – Starkville designed to make suicide attempts and death by suicide a never event. Informed by the 2012 National Strategy for Suicide Prevention and based off the SPRC’s comprehensive suicide prevention program, this new initiative aims to reduce suicides by 1. Increasing student connectedness and fostering belongingness; 2. broadening our mental health network by providing gatekeeper training to student leaders, faculty, and staff; and 3. creating new health and wellness initiatives aimed to help reduce suicidal ideation and encourage help-seeking behaviors. MSU is the largest university in the state of Mississippi with an enrollment of 21,883 students and growing. Although a majority of our students are from the state of Mississippi, 65 percent, we have a large number of out-of-state, 32 percent and international students from 80 countries around the world, 4 percent. Our campus is extremely diverse with 18.6 percent of students being African American and 28.3 percent affiliating with an ethnic minority group. The MSU Initiative has nine primary objectives based upon the SPRC evidence-based model. The project aims to 1. increase our ability to identify and assist students in distress, 2. increase student help-seeking behaviors, 3. provide evidence-based, effective care, 4. improve links between providers to ensure seamless transitions, 5. increasing connectedness, 6. teach new life skills and increase resilience, 7. reduce access to suicide means, 8. implement a postvention plan, and 9. utilize an evidence-based crisis response plan. The focus of the project will be building the infrastructure for a sustainable, evidence-based comprehensive suicide prevention program. Through this funding we aim to train at least 1,000 students, faculty, staff, and community members. We will also build a strong infrastructure through further development and validation of our gatekeeper training, developing a first year student course designed to teach life-skills and improve resilience, improving the mental health services offered on campus, and implementing service-learning opportunities designed to increase connectedness and reduce burdensomeness. Although the grant funding will last only three years, the focus of our initiative is to create a permanent and sustainable suicide prevention network at MSU aimed at making suicide a never event. The project is based upon the recommendations in the 2012 National Strategy for Suicide Prevention, inspired by Zero Suicide, and takes advantage the SPRC’s evidence-based model for comprehensive suicide prevention.

Marshall University Suicide Prevention Education Across Campus (MU-SPEAC) program is a collaborative approach between multiple academic and campus departments, including: Social Work, Psychology, Counseling, Public Health, Nursing, Physical Therapy, the School of Pharmacy, Joan C. Edwards School of Medicine, Counseling Center, MU Wellness Center, Office of Veteran’s Affairs, Behavioral Health and Psychology Clinic, LGBTQ Office, Women’s Center, Office of Student Conduct, MU INTO Program, University Residence Halls, Student Support (first generation support), and the Athletic Department. MU-SPEAC will create a comprehensive public health approach to assist individuals at risk for suicidal behavior and to create a safer campus community. The program will also partner with state and community organizations that provide behavioral health support and suicide prevention education. MU-SPEAC will create a campus Advisory Team to provide education and services to prevent suicide among Marshall students. ALL MU students, including specific targeted populations (veterans, athletes, individuals who identify as LGBTQ, first generation, freshmen, medical students, professional groups and other at-risk groups) will be the population served by the programs and services provided in this grant. The taskforce will be comprised of campus and community stakeholders, including students. MU is a multi-campus, public university that provides undergraduate and graduate education to 13,000 students in West Virginia. MU-SPEAC is a public health approach that will consist of developing and providing culturally sensitive training to teach staff and faculty the necessary skills to provide evidence-based screening and intervention for individuals who are at risk for suicidal behavior and other related risk factor behaviors, such as substance misuse. This public health approach will target students at the universal, selective, and indicated levels. Universal strategies will target the entire MU student body to increase population based health and prevention. Specific programs at the level will include: education, gatekeeper training, awareness activities, social marketing, and working to increase help-seeking behavior, while decreasing stigma. Selected populations who have been shown to be at risk for suicide behavior, mental health concerns, and substance misuse will be targeted with suicide prevention strategies. Finally, MU-SPEAC will provide targeted clinical and prevention strategies toward Indicated groups on campus. These will be students who have made a suicide attempt, are in treatment for depression and anxiety, express suicidal thoughts/ideation and plans, are survivors of loss due to suicide, are recovering from substance misuse, and who are survivors of loss due to substance misuse. The MU-SPEAC grant will provide a collaborative framework to develop and implement a comprehensive public health approach using evidence-based programs and practices to address suicide on Marshall University’s campus.

The More Aware Initiative (MAI) is a comprehensive, collaborative, innovative, and unified approach to improving student mental health and wellness, while working to eliminate suicide among Kent State University (KSU) students. In fall 2017, 39,367 students were enrolled at KSU, with 71.2% at the main campus. About 60% are female and 70% are Caucasian. Recent data indicate that KSU students have a higher rate of depression, anxiety, suicidal ideation, and attempted suicide in the last 12 months as compared college students nationally. Over the past five years, suicide attempts, ideation, and threats have generally increased for KSU students. To promote positive mental health and decrease suicidal ideation and attempts at KSU, the initiative will achieve five primary objectives: 1) Infrastructure: develop a comprehensive and coordinated network infrastructure to expand and enhance mental health, substance abuse and related programming and services for the KSU community. The network infrastructure will include peer-led programming and activities designed to improve student mental health and wellness and reduce incidents of students in crisis, 2) Gatekeeper Trainings: offer expanded and comprehensive options for students, faculty, staff, and families to become gatekeepers through online Kognito and QPR trainings and in-person Mental Health First Aid gatekeeper trainings, 3) Mental Health Screenings: promote and offer expanded in-person and online mental health and substance abuse screenings, 4) Increase Awareness of Mental Health Services: develop and implement a comprehensive campaign to promote and raise awareness of mental health and substance use and related issues and services. The campaign will include the creation of branding, developing student service materials, and unification and enhancement of campus mental health web pages, and 5) Increase Prevention Efforts: raise awareness and provide education to students through a peer-led initiative to provide innovative programming and activities. The initiative will develop and host Flash-Up events on the KSU main and all 7 regional campuses that will substantially increase the current reach of mental health and wellness-related programming and activities. Programming will be used to disseminate educational materials, improve mental wellness, raise awareness, increase coping skills and improve resiliency among approximately 39,000 students annually and 117,000 throughout the lifetime of the project. Aspects of the initiative, will specifically focus on at-risk groups such as students identifying as LGBTQ. The initiative will collect data from a variety of sources and levels not only to evaluate the effectiveness of the initiative as a whole, but to assess individual programs and activities as promising practices.