The Kaleidoscope Initiative
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Megan Forman (left) Megan has talent as a public speaker and planner. She is passionate about mental health awareness and understands how vital it is to start the conversation.
Aleiagh Hynds (right) Aleiagh is a talented photographer and media editor. She understands the complexity of mental health disorders and the value of talking about it in a variety of different methods.
Our Name
Mental health disorders can be portrayed in many different ways. The confusion and complexity of mental health disorders can be aptly represented by a kaleidoscope; the lines and colors represent the different struggles and disorders under the mental health umbrella.
The Community Need
Mental illness is a growing issue in our society. There is a lot of stigma and lack of education surrounding mental illness which we feel is crucial to address. Mental health is not solely a personal struggle but a struggle that affects entire communities.
A big piece of understanding the current attitudes towards mental illness is learning where they stemmed from and how persistent uneducated and uninformed such views have been.
"People with serious mental illness are challenged doubly. They struggle with the symptoms and disabilities that result from the disease. They are [also] challenged by the stereotypes and prejudice that result from misconceptions about mental illness." (World Psychiatry Journal)
The stigmatization of mental health makes it an avoided topic when it really needs to be talked about.
It is avoidance that exacerbates the issue and further isolates those who struggle with mental illness.
According to research reported by CNN, 1 in 7 kids suffer from mental health disorders and half of those disorders go untreated. These are not kids in just the U.S. or just kids in developing countries- these are kids all over the world. These numbers are far too high to ignore.
Community Partnership
We have partnered with Ms. Jennifer Lasher, a high school history and psychology teacher; and Ms. Gretchen Powers, a counselor at the middle school. We have a close relationship with Ms. Lasher and when we approached her about advising us on our project, she was more than happy to get involved. Aleiagh knows Ms. Powers and has talked with her about the project. Ms. Powers believes that addressing mental health with middle schoolers allows them to develop the proper skill set to appropriately deal with not only their own mental health struggles, but the struggles of anyone around them.
We have connected with the Children's Mental Health Campaign (CMHC). This Massachusetts-based campaign focuses on children's mental health (diagnosis, prevention, and treatment). The campaign has partnered with various local organizations (including Boston Children’s Hospital and Health Law Advocates). CMHC focuses on many important areas where mental health care is lacking, including schools and the justice system.
Action Plan
Megan organized the bake sale and met with one of the school's vice principals to discuss a fundraising idea. Megan has connected with the Children's Mental Health Campaign and set up a fundraising page with them (the link to donate is here). Megan, along with other students, held a booth at a Coffeehouse event and collected money. The Kaleidoscope Initiative raised over $50 and plans to donate the total amount to the Children's Mental Health campaign. Currently, Megan is working on painting two murals in the school.
Aleiagh has compiled some of the photos she has already taken that are representative of mental health. She has talked with Ms. Powers about what we can do in the middle school and is looking to start an official conversation soon. Currently, she is also creating a consent form so we can start taking more photos.
We coordinated with the Jam Band (a band of high schoolers) to host a fundraiser called "How to Save the World Coffeehouse." The Service Learning class partnered with various other groups in the school to create a very successful event.
Megan at the Coffeehouse.
Completing the second mural (the first one is completed) and donating the money earned at the Coffeehouse are our two next steps. With our mental health research, Aleiagh's photography, and stories shared by volunteers, we aim to create a photo campaign. At the Coffeehouse, we had educational material that explains the situation and promotes our message. We believe that research is incredibly important to understand the scope of the issue and that every piece of it is intricately connected. We cannot tackle the stigma around mental health without tackling the lack of knowledge about it.
A Day in the Class
Each day this class looks different for us so there's no set list of things we can include that appropriately captures our day-to-day activities. For example, however, on October 17, 2019 we did the following:
- worked on the presentation: pulled together research, planned for the day of the event
- set up finance sheet: outlined our expected income and expenses
- created logo: used Piktochart to create the logo and printed it
Megan working on one of the murals.
Learning
We have learned that service-learning projects require a lot of planning and patience before any meaningful action can be done. We spent a lot of time brainstorming about fundraising ideas and discussing which events would be realistically successful.
Our initial plan was to host an event at the high school but we realized that if we worked with younger kids, we would be more influential.
When we pitched our presentation, we had some of our peers just within the class approach us and said they would be willing to tell their stories. This outpouring of support in a small class surprised us and further alerted us to the reach of mental health and how present it is even among all groups of people.
Overall, we have gained a lot of knowledge about what it takes to plan a project that addresses such a complicated issue. There are a lot of moving pieces and we have successfully navigated them to create a meaningful project.