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Youth Suicide Action Team "Daughter-Spirit"
Early in 2007 NWAC began youth focus groups on suicide prevention. Through these focus groups NWAC found that youth felt a lack of support in their communities, leading to depression, isolation, desperation and hopelessness. Many of the youth interviewed felt that only when they are getting the support they need in all areas of health – physical, mental, emotional and spiritual – will they see suicide rates diminish. As a result of this NWAC is continuing its work with National Aboriginal Youth Suicide Prevention Strategy (NAYSPS) in coordination with Health Canada's First Nations and Inuit Health Branch (FNIHB) to develop a youth specific suicide prevention pilot community development project by the end of 2007/08 fiscal year. Based on the findings from the regional focus groups, the pilot community developed a strategy which combines capacity building, team training and the creation of a youth-driven Mental Health Promotion activity model. Through our partnerships with our PTMAs and Youth Council, NWAC will be able to act as mentors in the implementation of the model project. The pilot community development project will meet the requirements as outlined in the NAYSPS framework representing primary prevention and some knowledge development. NWAC facilitates at the national level – overseeing activities of the "Youth Action Team” created in the region of one of our YC members. Named “Daughter Spirit”, the project specifically meet the needs of female Aboriginal youth and is created by female Aboriginal youth. NWAC aids Daughter Spirit in obtaining suicide prevention training, providing audio-visual training and will help with a video project to help other people complete similar initiatives in their communities. Logo and slogan explanation: The Action Team participants chose team name “Daughter Spirit” and the slogan “Envisioning our life and future” to reflect the idea that every participant is a daughter and that they all learned from their Elders. The slogan represents the collective notion that together they can modify the negative vision that Aboriginal youth often have about their future and instead celebrate the possibilities that lie ahead. In designing their logo, youth envisioned an image that symbolized youth and Elders and the crucial connection between them represented by the braid connecting the two figures. For more information please contact the Youth Suicide Prevention Coordinator, Dan Peters, 613.722.3033 ext. 249 or 1.800.461.4043. |
