Peer-to-peer suicide prevention program helps middle and high school students

WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. — Pictures of 16 students hang on a bulletin board inside Williamsport Area High School, letting their classmates know they are available to talk about mental health. The students are a part of the Hope Squad program, a nationwide suicide prevention program that started at a high school in Utah.

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"It's a peer-to-peer suicide prevention program. It's a nationwide program, and how we came about finding this—I did a training on mental health for teens, and at the end, they spoke about Hope Squad, and it was being introduced into a high school in Pennsylvania," said Julie Caringi, a social worker for Williamsport Area High School.

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Williamsport Area High School and Middle School started the program at the start of the school year. Caringi says the program helps students know they are not alone.

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"We have had some past losses in the past five years with students, and mental health has become a really big issue since the pandemic, and students talk to students and this was a peer mentoring type of program," said Caringi.

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Students in the Hope Squad program were nominated by their peers through a survey that asked them what students they feel most comfortable talking to in their grades.

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We did a lot of awareness activities—we had a Hope Week, it was kind of like a spirit week in a way where we had a lot of school-wide peers participate in events and we wrote nice note cards to all the students around the school," said senior Alonzo Rice.

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Hope Squad members recently made cards of encouragement for students who are taking Keystone exams, Pennsylvania's standardized testing program.

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"We sat down, and we made them because we thought it was important to give hope to people during the Keystones because a lot of the times a lot of students feel discouraged, so we thought that it was important to be like, 'Hey, you got this,'" said sophomore Fiona Menc.

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A new group of students for the Hope Squad program will be nominated in the fall.

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If you are in crisis, please seek help immediately.

• If you or someone you know is struggling or in crisis, help is available. Call or text 988 or chat 988lifeline.org.
• Text MHA to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor from Crisis Text Line.
• Call 911 or go to the nearest emergency room.