Tanana Chiefs Conference

The Tanana Chiefs Conference Wellness Project will serve Alaska Native youth living in the Alaska Interior region. The purpose of the proposed project is to build and implement a youth suicide intervention system and to expand TCC suicide intervention activities. We will provide community outreach, implement highly successful Wellness Teams in 14 new communities, we will engage youth through the American Indian Life Skills Curriculum and Sources of Strength, and we will provide 24-hour availability of crisis intervention, clinical screening and assessment, immediate response and brief intervention, as well as follow-up services to youth at risk of suicide.

Our goal for this project is to reduce the youth suicide rate in the TCC region by increasing 1) the number of youth who are referred for behavioral health care services; 2) the number of youth at risk for suicide who receive behavioral health services; and 3) the number of youth at risk for suicide who have positive outcomes as a result of behavioral health services. To reach these goals, TCC will:

1. Engage the targeted communities in suicide intervention, by providing community outreach and messaging to increase individuals awareness of suicide and their knowledge of crisis intervention services; and expanding our highly successful Wellness Team model to communities in our region that have not developed one. We will develop 14 new Wellness Teams and strengthen our 16 existing teams; reach 3,641 individuals with outreach messages and train 375 community members.
2. Engage youth-serving organizations by providing various levels of suicide intervention training, including SafeTALK, QPR, and/or Mental Health First Aide. To behavioral health care and health care personnel we will provide ASIST as well as Postvention training. We will provide training to behavioral health and other social service providers a year.
3. Engage youth in suicide intervention activities that 1) help them develop resiliency and lessen feeling of hopelessness and 2) provide them with suicide awareness and the skills they need to intervene and refer their suicidal peers. We will use two methods to engage youth:direct training to youth using the American India n Life Skills Curriculum as leaders, engaging them in the Sources of Strength program. We will reach 200 students and 16 schools.
4. Build and implement a suicide intervention system to address the unique needs of youth. We will integrate this system into TCCs overall Adult Behavioral Health system, and provide 24-hour availability of crisis intervention, clinical screening and assessment, immediate response and brief intervention, as well as follow-up services, reaching 25 youth a year.