Today@Sam Article

ELEVATE Launches Mental Health Campaign

Jan. 17, 2024
SHSU Media Contact: Mikah Boyd

ELEVATE, Sam Houston State University’s wellness committee, is launching a mental health campaign, PAWS for Mental Health. The campaign is part of ELEVATE’s mission to create a healthy campus culture and environment at SHSU and will feature stories from members of the Bearkat community.

Lindsey Lopez is the co-chair of ELEVATE and taking the lead on PAWS for Mental Health, which she has hoped to launch since seeing a similar program years ago. The program she drew inspiration from featured students sharing their struggles with mental health and how they have learned to manage it. Lopez worked with her peers in the ELEVATE committee to expand the scope of the initiative to encompass all of the SHSU community.

“The intent behind the campaign is to increase awareness of mental health issues but also, it’s really a stigma-reduction campaign,” Lopez said. “We really want people to feel comfortable sharing those things and, hopefully, whether it’s connection to self-care or resources on or off campus, we really wanted people to be open to the conversations and starting the conversations.”

By having campus community members of all backgrounds sharing their stories, ELEVATE hopes to encourage students, faculty and staff to see each other in a new light. The initial request for stories resulted in 85 submissions, a figure that blew away Lopez and her colleagues. As they sorted through the submissions, they found that some are facing similar struggles, which makes sharing their stories even more impactful in showing Bearkats that they are not alone.

“We have faculty and staff from across campus and students from different majors,” Lopez said. “If you look at it that way, it really is a diverse group of people involved who are willing to share about their experiences.”

After meticulously sorting through the submissions, Lopez and her fellow ELEVATE committee members worked with campus partners to craft the imagery and messaging they needed. Th

e final product includes carefully crafted social media posts, banners and signs that will share stories of triumph with the campus community.

The brief messages emphasize how many people struggle with their mental health and that speaking up or seeking help in any form can ease the burden on their mind. By incorporating stories from people that could be seen in class or around campus, PAWS for Mental Health hopes to drive home that mental health care is for everyone.

“We want to do it in a way that shows no matter what you’re going through, there is hope for it to get better,” Lopez said. “But we want to talk about it in a positive way so people know, even if things may not be going well, through self-care, self-help or getting counseling or medication, things do not have to stay that way.”

After this semester’s initial rollout, ELEVATE aims to continue the PAWS for Mental Health campaign and potentially expand with programming.

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