PROJECT MENTAL HEALTH AWARENESS
By Kaylee Davis-Bordovsky, MD
Igrew up outside of Dallas/Fort Worth
in rural Texas, where mental health
was heavily stigmatized. Coming from
a family of educators, I realized the
importance and impact that schools
have on students, not only for their education
but their mental health. This experience is one
of the reasons I decided to go into the fi eld
of psychiatry and specifi cally why I wanted to
work with schools and mental health promotion.
Mental health is more important now
than ever with the noticeable eff ects of the
COVID-19 pandemic on children and adolescents1,2.
Even before the pandemic, rates of
depression, anxiety, and mental illness in general
was signifi cant; according to the World
Health Organization, one in seven teenagers
between the ages of 10 and 19 have a mental
disorder3. In addition, the CDC reports that in
2019, approximately one in six youth reported
seriously contemplating suicide in the previous
year, which is a 44% increase over the
last decade4. Unfortunately, compared to
other age groups, children and adolescents
have the lowest rates of treatment engagement5,6.
This may be due to stigma or lack of
knowledge on how to seek help. If we could
utilize the peer-peer model for students to
educate each other about mental illness and
promote help-seeking behavior, we could
address this signifi cant gap in care. It wasn’t
until I did a research rotation at UCLA during
medical school that I got the inspiration for
my program, Project Mental Health Awareness
(PMHA), to address this specifi c problem.
The Inspiration
PMHA is based loosely on a youth-driven
gambling awareness campaign in California
in which I had the privilege to research.
Diff erent groups of youth across California
(some school based, some in after-school
programs) put together a public service announcement
(PSA) targeted toward the youth
about the adverse eff ects and resources for
problem gambling. Each group of students
was given a brief lecture over problem
gambling, but for the most part, the students
had to learn how to eff ectively research so
they could get accurate facts themselves.
In a period spanning from three days to six
months — depending on the project site —
each group scripted, directed, fi lmed, and
edited a 30- to
45-second PSA.
In addition,
they made a
poster PSA. At
the end of the
time period, the
program held
a “fi lm festival”
where the
students had
the opportunity
to dress up
(similar to the
red carpet) and
show their work
to everybody,
including their
community.
Through my research,
I found that this peer-peer education
model was extremely eff ective in not only
teaching the youth about the problem at
hand (gambling in this case), but actually
preventing them from gambling themselves
and even empowering them to step up and
help others stop gambling. In addition, the
students loved the program and gained
lifelong skills that they felt would help them in
future collegiate and career endeavors.
As I left my research experience, I was
inspired by the perceived impact of the program
on the participants. I began to wonder,
“What if the students did PSAs on more than
just gambling? What would happen if we expanded
it to all mental health topics? What if
the students got to choose what is important
to them — they know more about what is
happening with their peers than me, correct?
Why is this not available in all schools?” The
wheels started spinning in my head as the
possibilities seemed endless. It was then that
I decided to make my own program, and thus
PMHA was born.
Project Mental Health Awareness
(PMHA)
Overall, PMHA is similar to the California
program in that it facilitates students in making
PSAs. However, the students are encouraged
to pick a mental health topic that
resonates with them. They are encouraged to
refl ect on the following questions:
• What type of mental health problems do
you see in your peers and your school?
• What isn’t talked about enough? What
do you wish you knew more about?
• If you or a friend were struggling with a
specifi c mental health problem, would
you know where to go?
The students get into small groups of two
to fi ve for this project. They have a student
handout that walks them through the key
elements of a PSA. The four key elements are
the topic, target audience, message, and
resource. After choosing their topic, they must
decide who is their target audience — for
example, do they want to target the whole
student body or just students that may be
suff ering from depression? They decide on
the message of their PSA — for example, is
the goal to educate about the adverse effects
of marijuana or is it to prevent use? And
lastly, they must decide on what resource
they are going to provide, true to the spirit of
a PSA — for example, in a PSA about anxiety,
do they want to provide a website to learn
more information, or do they want to tell the
audience to talk to their doctor? It is stressed
to them the importance of an appropriate
resource with their message; if their PSA is
targeting suicidal students, you would not
just provide a website, but provide resources
on how to seek help. Once the students have
these four key elements, the educator approves
it to make sure the outline is appropriate.
Once approved, they then must script
RESEARCH
A SCHOOL CURRICULUM FOR THE YOUTH, BY THE YOUTH
12 | DALLAS MEDICAL JOURNAL • May 2022