Safe, happy and healthy children are goals for a community and as Canadians we hope and strive for it every day as parents and teachers.
But while that is a collective goal, it is not always the reality. Children often struggle under the weight of stress, worries and, in some circumstances, they are the victims of abuse or grow up in a violent environment.
For child abuse survivor and advocate Sheldon Kennedy, talking about childhood experiences of abuse or violence is a key part of his Child Advocacy Centre’s mandate.
The effort by Kennedy and the centre to shine a light into the dark places that exist for some children in our community is moving forward locally with several local students from Canmore Collegiate High School taking on the role of youth champions.
“The reality is that 80 per cent of mental health issues in this country and in this world have been made up from adverse childhood experiences such as child abuse or kids growing up in a violent home,” Kennedy said while in Canmore at CCHS last Friday (April 29).
“I think what we are doing is making the invisible visible. We make the invisible visible through science and brain imaging that allows us to know the impact on the development of brains of children and why these presenting issues are happening.
“Lots of times, when we see kids fall off the rails with addiction, self harm or depression, there is more to it. So how do we give kids opportunities and tools to ask the question of not what is wrong with you, but what happened to you?”
He said scientific research on the effect of traumatic events on brain development in children and youth has shown those situations take a toll and manifest in mental health issues. By helping youth connect the dots from the impact on trauma to mental health, Kennedy said they gain a better understanding of the issue and the ability to communicate how they feel.
With that in mind, the Child Advocacy Centre has selected youth champions from a number of Alberta schools, including CCHS, who have over the past three years been educated on the science and the impact.
As part of the program, youth champions were asked to create public service announcements – short videos that explore the issue of how adverse childhood experiences affect mental health.
The Canmore youth champions gathered for a “dry run” presenting the PSA videos at the school to help foster a positive, safe and caring school environment.
Canadian Rockies Public Schools Superintendent Chris MacPhee said the program and having youth champions at the school has been “extremely beneficial.
“I would say we already have an extremely safe and caring environment, but what this provides are tools, venues and opportunities for students to know it is safe to have any discussion around mental health, or abuse, or those issues that they want to talk about and there are people to support them.”
In addition to Canmore, schools in Airdrie, Okotoks, Strathmore and Calgary are involved in the youth champion program. CCHS teacher Sabrina Grecu said she has been involved in the initiative for the past two years and it has incorporated a lot of powerful discussions around mental health and education.
“It is a powerful collaboration to build resiliency and the tools to be advocates for mental health,” Grecu said. “Those youth champions are leaders in their school and they are taking the reigns on promoting positive mental health and sharing that with their peers and the student body. It is a very special role because there is a lot of vulnerability in that topic.”
Grade 12 student Brooke Anderson is one of eight youth champions at CCHS and she has taken the responsibility of implementing the program locally.
“The idea of the program is to create awareness and create a proactive attitude about this kind of thing,” she said. “They give us a lot of liberty with this and we have taken that and all the information given to us in the past few years (to create the PSAs).
“To start out small, our message is ‘it starts with you.’ It starts with taking care of your own mental health and figuring out how doing that will affect other areas of your life.”
Anderson said the local students partnered with local initiative Creative Spark to craft the message they wanted to convey in the three PSAs they created. She said all three are related to the message that it starts with you.
“For me, it is about the message and when I learned the message on our first day, I was absolutely inspired to come into the school and do everything I could to bring the program into the school and the community,” Anderson said.
Go to sheldonkennedycac.ca for more information on the Child Advocacy Centre and the work they do. The full public rollout of the PSAs from various high schools will be some time in the near future.
