On Oct. 1, Student Council and other identified student leaders had an all day Sources of Strength training in Manitou Springs High School’s Media Center. The student council and adult advisors were excited for the activities involved and to teach the other peer leaders more mental health practices and techniques.
Sources of Strength is a mental health and suicide awareness program, for which the training happens once a year. It is a program made for schools to promote mental health practices and suicide prevention. Created by Mark LoMurray in 1998, it was aimed to address teen suicides ahead of time rather than reacting to them when it was already too late.
Katie Pratt, the staff leader of Sources of Strength was happy with how well it went this year. “I was very impressed with the student turnout as well as the way that students participated with positive energy,” Pratt said.
Pratt is a social worker for Manitou Springs School District. She is happy to see the difference it could make at the high school this year, after seeing how it has helped the middle school. “I love public health things, and so this is the third school that I’ve helped launch Sources of Strength at,” she said.
Sources of Strength stopped in high school for a few years. “With the pandemic, it faded out a little bit; and so we’re bringing it back for a second round,” Pratt said.
She hopes to keep Sources of Strength going in high schools in order to keep teaching the kids good mental health practices. “The research shows that if we can establish help seeking patterns with youth that students are much more likely to reach out for support when they or a peer is struggling,” Pratt said.
Pratt feels that teaching students good mental health practices is necessary to help kids with anxiety, depression or even suicidal thoughts. StuCo was a big help with this year’s Sources of Strength training. They helped come up with the ideas for the Sources of Strength training’s games and activities. “it’s really student driven,” Pratt said, “and they get to decide which campaigns we do.”
Felix Banagale (10), a student council member who is a returning student for Sources of Strength, had some concerns. This being the freshman’s first high school experience with Sources of Strength day, some of the older staff were worried the freshmen wouldn’t like it as much as they did in middle school. But overall it went very well. The freshmen had a positive attitude and reaction. “I know I was concerned, and a few of the staff members were concerned about the freshman’s response to it,” Banagale said.
Pratt wanted to bring the StuCo members in so more Sources of Strength activities and practices could be implemented throughout the school. “We brought every single person from StuCo into Sources of Strength, so that they could all go through the training,” Noah Theys (11), Student Body President, said.
Sources of Strength training was great for the students involved, helping them get to know each other more, though it was a little slow at first, with people splitting off into social groups. “Throughout the day, we really bonded with each other and found one thing in common, which is that we’re all working towards the same goal, and that’s to improve our school,” Theys said.
Hoping to spread awareness of these subjects, the school will be doing Sources of Strength campaigns throughout the year. “It will be housed in the StuCo throughout the rest of the school year,” Pratt said. “The idea of it is that we do campaigns across campus to bring awareness to mental health issues and possible ways to mitigate those.”
Though some students felt that the subjects were heavy, with suicide and mental health being talked about, they were very happy to help. “I feel good about it. I think it’s something that we should do more,” Dylan Tindall (9), a member of the student council said.
Teaching kids not only how to help themselves but also others is a prime goal of Sources of Strength. “Kids are going through changes almost every single day, weekly, monthly, that some don’t know how to control better than others,” Theys said.
“I think it’s such an overlooked thing throughout high school that some people are really good about addressing it,” Theys said. “Some people just kind of ignore it and push it to the side, but I think it’s something that needs to be spoken out about more.”
