“The Forefront in Schools program is helping schools to move from a crisis response to prevent student suicides further upstream to a greater awareness of mental health and social and emotional learning,” says Forefront co-founder and faculty director, UW School of Social Work Associate Professor Jennifer Stuber. Recently, many of the program's partner schools have asked for additional communication strategies in light of a controversial Netflix series “13 Reasons Why.”
Some mental health professionals have criticized the series because depression and mental illness—keys to understanding suicide—are rarely mentioned and the story's heroine tells her story after her death, which sends a potentially dangerous and romanticized message.
To the staff of the School of Social Work-based Forefront: Innovations in Suicide Prevention and the student volunteers with Huskies for Suicide Prevention and Awareness (HSPA), “13 Reasons Why” portrays suicide in exactly the wrong light—making it all the more important, they say, to broadcast the right message far and wide. That message: That suicide is a public health issue, one that people need to talk and educate themselves about in order to provide help to those who need it, and to remove a variety of myths and misconceptions.
“If there’s one good thing to come from the show, it’s that discussions are happening,” said Shira Rosen, Forefront’s director of school & higher education programs. “The challenge for us is, are full, positive discussions happening, and who’s having them? That’s where we’re involving ourselves.”
To that end, Forefront published a statement on its website, which includes strategies for helping someone who is contemplating suicide and an analysis of how the Netflix series addressed various issues.
Meanwhile, organizers of the 2-mile H3 Suicide Prevention Awareness Walk aim to draw 1,000 participants and to raise $10,000 at the May 20 event. Last year’s walk raised $8,000, which HSPA said helps fund campus suicide awareness programs and Forefront Cares packages to people grieving the loss of a loved one to suicide. This year, HSPA’s UW Speak Up Project, a mental health campaign and storytelling platform, added portraits of advocates as another medium through which to raise awareness.
The Husky Help & Hope Suicide Prevention Awareness Walk begins at 10:30 a.m. May 20 at the UW Sylvan Grove Theater and Columns. Registration is available here.