In September, a group of Oakland University faculty was awarded an institutional grant to increase suicide awareness and prevention efforts throughout both the campus and local community.

The project, known as Grizzlies Response: Awareness and Suicide Prevention, received the $612,000, three-year Garrett Lee Suicide Prevention grant from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, according to the OU website.

Michael MacDonald, associate professor in the teacher development and educational studies department, Lisa Hawley, associate professor of education and chair of the counselling department, Dalton Connally, assistant professor of social work, and Patricia Wren, associate professor and program director of health sciences, make up the team working on the project.

 

Working towards the goals

MacDonald said in order to qualify for the grant, GRASP needed to demonstrate the capacity to understand the field and explain how they would help students struggling with mental health issues.

“We had to articulate who’s at risk,” Wren said.

This type of grant is designed to help institutions and required a match in funding from OU, according to Wren.

“As an institution, we knew we needed to have a better response,” Connally said.

Wren said Interim Senior Vice President and Provost Susan Awbrey, Vice President of Student Affairs and Enrollment Management Mary Beth Snyder and former Senior Vice President and Provost Virinder Moudgil all found institutional matches for the grant because they believed OU needed a program like this.

“We certainly got support from different parts of campus,” MacDonald said.

 

Helping students and beyond

The program’s narrative explains that GRASP will focus not only on OU, but the southeastern Michigan community. The money received from the grant will help create educational programs aimed at students and will also create workshops for identified caregivers to learn how to deal with students who are feeling depressed, suicidal or are taking part in destructive behaviors, according to MacDonald.

In addition to workshops and training sessions, MacDonald said GRASP will create a Web presence so those seeking help will have a place to turn to for resources, as well as a virtual learning community to oversee the initiative and serve as a forum for discussion.

Hawley said they hope to begin the training program in the winter semester and are currently in the data-collecting and planning stage. The creation of a website would come sometime after the new year.

Hawley said GRASP plans to train more than 20 percent of the campus community on suicide prevention and caregiving methods, and some of these sessions will take place in the residence halls.

“It (the program) has to involve the whole community,” Hawley said.

 

Hoping for results

Connally hopes this project will remove the social stigma that comes with talking about suicide.

Wren wants this project to help students feel safe and confident in discussing their feelings with friends and professors.

Hawley said the project will also create ways for the university to help with drug and alcohol prevention.

MacDonald said he hopes the project will attract all groups of people who suffer from suicidal thoughts and destructive behaviors, and that nobody feels alienated while seeking help.

“It’s everybody’s business, everybody’s concern,” he said.

 

Contact Assistant Campus Editor Natalie Popovski via email at [email protected]