The second annual Mental Health Awareness Week, an effort to raise awareness of and destigmatize mental health issues, began Monday on the Quad.

Syracuse University’s Student Association, Office of Health Promotion, Active Minds, National Alliance on Mental Illness and other organizations collaborated to plan the event.

The event began last year, when then-SA Vice President Joyce LaLonde came to the Office of Health Promotion with the idea for the weeklong effort, said current SA Vice President Angie Pati.

“(Mental Health Awareness Week) is one of our largest priorities,” Pati said. “It’s something we’re excited to see come to fruition and develop as the years progress as well.”

This year, SA hosted Monday’s kick-off event, which included free T-shirts, a dunk tank, inflatable obstacle courses and games on the Quad. This was to highlight the enjoyable nature of mental health and to present stress-relieving activities, Pati said.

Alongside the games, Habitat for Humanity is hosting Shack-A-Thon, an event where different student organizations live in shacks on the Quad to raise awareness of homelessness in Syracuse.

“We’re partnering with Shack-A-Thon and Habitat for Humanity to not only talk about the enjoyable nature of mental health, but also this two-fold discussion about inequity in mental health, especially in our homeless population,” Pati said.

There will be a facilitated discussion about mental health and identity on Tuesday night called “Intersectionality Matters,” hosted by Active Minds and NAMI.

“Send Silence Packing,” a national event organized by Active Minds to spread awareness of suicide, will be at SU on Wednesday. There will be 1,100 backpacks displayed on the Quad to represent the 1,100 college students who commit suicide each year.

SU Active Minds hosted the event several years ago, and President Kylie Kerker said it was what got her most interested in the organization.

“(The event) got the ball rolling to increase the awareness of mental health on campus, and it brought attention to the lack of resources we have (at SU),” Kerker said.

The Office of Health Promotion will host Therapy Dog Thursday. Students can pet the dogs on the Quad for stress relief.

To close Mental Health Awareness Week on Thursday, there will be yoga and meditation sessions at sunset in the Quad. There will also be more free T-shirts given out that night.

Throughout the week, SA will also allot time each day in which people can tie green ribbons around trees on the Quad if they or someone they know has been affected by mental illness.

“A lot of times a continuous factor is you do feel alone,” Pati said. “Why we want to tie the ribbons on the trees is because like the branches on a tree, and like the leaves on a tree, we’re all connected and Orange Nation is all connected.”

Madeline Foreman | Contributing Photographer

Student organizations built shacks as part of the Shack-a-thon, an event created to raise awareness of Syracuse’s homeless population.

This year, SA brought in other organizations to make videos to promote Mental Health Awareness Week. There will be segments such as “Humans of Mental Health” videos, which will tell the stories of people in the SU community.

The Office of Health Promotion sponsored most of the projects last year with money through departmental initiative funding. This year, SA provided most of the money to put the week together with $5,000 from their Student Advancement fund.

“Student Association in general has been really great with supporting all of the work that’s going on and bringing a lot of new ideas to the table,” said Kristelle Aisaka, a health promotion specialist with a focus in mental health from the Office of Health Promotion. “So we’re really excited about it being even more of a collaborative project than it’s been.”

SA is passionate about continuing awareness and destigmatization of mental illness, Pati said.

The representatives from the organizations that planned the week said they hope it continues to grow and that more people and organizations will be inspired to participate.

“Everything from day one has really been a collaborative effort,” Aisaka said. “I don’t think anything could have been done without all of us.”

Published on October 2, 2017 at 11:10 pm

Contact Catherine: [email protected] | @ccleffert