Enhancing mental health education in north central kansas - mental health awareness training grant pawnee mental health will train individuals, through evidence-based curriculums of mental health…

Enhancing mental health education in north central kansas - mental health awareness training grant pawnee mental health will train individuals, through evidence-based curriculums of mental health first aid (mhfa), teen mental health first aid (tmhfa), youth mental health first aid (ymhfa), and question, persuade & refer (QPR), to recognize signs and symptoms of a mental health crisis and DE-escalate a situation. Our population focus will include chamber of commerce members for each community we serve. By targeting this group of leaders within the community, we can impact the largest number of community members in the geographic catchment area. The geographic catchment area will be the pawnee mental health service region that consists of 10 counties in north central kansas. In addition to chamber of commerce members, pawnee will also focus on reaching trusted decision-makers who can inform the agriculture community of this opportunity. Given the increase in agriculture suicides, we are determined to increase our reach within this population. Achieving our four main goals will help US to close the GAP to the unmet needs in our communities and increase the number of individuals aware of how to handle a mental health crisis. The unmet needs include 1) limited knowledge of mental health and services available among law enforcement, education, social services, the AG community, and the hispanic community; 2) bipoc and lgbtq populations have disproportionate rates of suicide, SMI and interactions with law enforcement; 3) underutilization of free mental health services by the agriculture community; 4) community members impacted by the stigma of mental health are unaware how to identify the signs and symptoms or how to deescalate someone experiencing a mental health crisis. The project goals to address these unmet needs include 1) increase the number of community members who receive mental health training; 2) expand the racial, ethnic, gender identity, sexual orientation, and social economic diversity of the community members who receive training; 3) increase the number of production farmers who access mental health services by utilizing pawnee's agriculture assistance program; 4) develop a promotional campaign to encourage participation in the training and access to community resources. In year one of the grant, we will train 500 individuals and plan to increase that number to 750 in year two, and 1000 individuals trained by year three.