Suicide Prevention Resources for New Jersey Residents

#BeThe1To is the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline’s message for National Suicide Prevention Month and beyond, spreading the word about actions we can all take to prevent suicide. Please review and share widely.

The five action steps for communicating with someone who may be suicidal are supported by evidence in the field of suicide prevention.

A Young Person’s Guide for Communicating Safely about Suicide Online.

For decades, the outgoing message for all mental health providers and organizations included the phrase, “If this is an emergency, please hang up and call 911.” As of July 16, 2022, there’s another 3-digit number that social workers should know about: 988.

AAKOMA builds the consciousness of youth of color and their caregivers on the recognition and importance of mental health, empowers youth and their families to seek help and manage mental health, and influences systems and services to receive and address the needs of youth of color and their families.

The AAP offers two new videos for teenagers coping with stress and anxiety that come from an accredited U.S. healthcare educator and are translated into 22 languages, including English. The videos are available now on the AAP YouTube channel. The video, “Anxiety Grounding Techniques: Finding Calm in Chaos,” leads viewers through the “5,4,3,2,1” technique, a simple yet powerful tool to help reconnect with the present. The video, “Unlocking Self-Compassion: Embrace Your Journey to Self-Love,” encourages viewers to practice self-compassion by discovering their unique strengths and embracing the quirks, challenges and beautiful qualities each of us has inside. Find the complete playlist here.

Suicide and suicidal behavior among youth and young adults is a major public health crisis. Suicide is the 2nd leading cause of death among young people 10-24 years of age in the United States (US), and rates have been rising for decades.

Active Minds was founded by Alison Malmon when she was a junior at the University of Pennsylvania following the suicide of her older brother, and only sibling, Brian. Active Minds was incorporated as a 501(c)3 organization in late 2003. National organization impacting young adults and mental health. Now in more than 1,000 campuses and communities, we directly reach more than 1.9 million people each year through awareness campaigns, events, advocacy, outreach, and more.

More Than Sad has taught over a million students and educators how to be smarter about mental health. 

Learn more about each program and purchase More Than Sad to receive the two More Than Sad films, Teen Depression and Preventing Teen Suicide below. All programs may be delivered in person or virtually.

Dr. Matt Wintersteen, Associate Professor, Director Research at Thomas Jefferson University, Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior talks about asking young people “are you okay?” and being prepared for the answer. Dr. Wintersteen has also received a research grant from AFSP.

Attitudes In Reverse® or AIR® offers a comprehensive mental health plan to educate youth, from elementary level through college-age. AIR’®s programs are wrapped in messages of understanding, empathy and kindness towards all.

The Bergen County STIGMA-FREE Initiative is a county-wide program which aims to reduce the stigma associated with mental illness. We are dedicated to raising awareness of the disease of mental illness and create a culture wherein residents who have the disease feel supported by their community and neighbors and feel free to seek treatment for the disease without fear of stigma.

A Stigma Free Toolkit is available for download.

Break Free from Depression (BFFD) is a four-module curriculum focused on increasing awareness about adolescent depression and designed for use in high school classrooms. The goals are to increase adolescents’ awareness about depression, teach them how to recognize it in themselves and in their friends, and give them strategies for finding help. This curriculum is now available online (more information is below). Included in the materials are step-by-step directions, handouts, resources, and all of the presentations for the student curriculum, parent workshop, and staff development workshop.

An open letter from a parent on what to expect and how to manage it.

Dedicated to transforming the lives of children and families struggling with mental health and learning disorders by giving them the help they need. Leading independent nonprofit in children’s mental health by providing gold-standard evidence-based care, delivering educational resources to millions of families each year, training educators in underserved communities, and developing tomorrow’s breakthrough treatments.

These evidence-based resources can help you teach your students the mental health skills they need to be more ready to learn.

In recognition of the current youth mental health crisis, the New Jersey Department of Children and Families has two public service announcements it is sharing this month to acknowledge September as Suicide Awareness Month and the start of a new school year. The first is our new PSA, illustrating how youth can seek help.  Both PSAs were created with youth participation and parents also participated in the creation of the CSOC PSA.

1-877-652-7624

The Children’s System of Care (CSOC) is New Jersey’s public behavioral health system. CSOC serves youth under age 21 with emotional and mental health care needs, substance use challenges, and/or intellectual/developmental disabilities and their families. CSOC provides community-based services that are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, to support the needs of the youth and family.

Whether your suicide loss has been of a patient/client, loved one, student, and/or colleague, we know that the impact of this traumatic loss can be profoundly painful, that it often extends into our professional work and identities. In addition, due to the unfortunate stigma (both around suicide and professional vulnerability) that exists with our field, we know that there are very few “places” to even acknowledge this loss or its impact. We want to welcome you to join the CCS, and hope that this is a site where you can find understanding, validation and support, and to know that you are not alone.

The Coalition of Clinician Survivors exists to provide support, education, resources and consultation  to mental health professionals and other professional caregivers who have experienced suicide losses in personal and/or professional contexts. We recognize that, regardless of whether the loss was of a loved one, a client/patient or a student, the repercussions are profound and are likely to impact a clinician both personally and professionally.

The job of a cop is stressful, demanding, and often dangerous. The lifestyle affects the lives of officers, spouses, partners, children, and friends. We’ve been there, and are here now, to provide resources, guidance, understanding, and support.

Call for Support: 866-267-2267

Is your child in crisis? This PDF will help you know the signs. All kids have bad days. But, trauma and life-changing events can create lasting challenges.

Mental health and suicide prevention in the Black community are explored in the new NorthJersey.com documentary, “Ending the Stigma.”

No school leader wants to plan for a tragic loss in their community, but David Aderhold argues that this goes hand-in-hand with prioritizing mental health.

Ending the Silence is a free, evidence-based, 50-minute session designed for middle and high school students. Your students will learn about mental health conditions through a brief presentation, short videos, and personal testimony from a young adult who describes their journey to recovery.

Our mission is to make sure no young person feels alone in their depression. We are dedicated to creating a community of empathy and education. We create upper elementary, middle school and high school mental health, depression and suicide awareness programs so educators, families and teens can create safe spaces to learn about mental health, letting students know they are never alone, and there is somewhere to turn.

We know that parents can help push education in their community and open up the conversation to help break stigma around teen depression. We know that, together, we can get your child, and children across the country, access to tools and resources in their schools.

Identify students who are at risk of suicide or possible harm to others through threats, violence, and bullying.

The PAX Good Behavior Game is an evidence-based universal preventive intervention applied by teachers in the classroom. This evidence-based practice consists of a set of research-based strategies with origins in behavioral science, neuroscience, and cultural wisdom that operate together to improve children’s self-regulation. Teachers implement these strategies as part of their daily routines in carrying out tasks such as getting students’ attention, selecting students for tasks, transitioning from one task to the next, working as part of a team, limiting problematic behavior, and reinforcing pro-social behavior.

Resources for parents of high school and college/university students.

From detecting the warning signs to addressing the stigma, learn how to recognize suicidal behavior in others, gather prevention tools and resources, and find out where to get help today.

Informative PDF detailing the best way to help a friend who is in need of support.

Hopeful Minds is a project developed by iFred, the International Foundation for Research and Education on Depression. It is based on research that suggests hope is teachable (a skill). The aim is to equip students, teachers, and parents with the tools they need to define, learn, and grow a hopeful mindset and prevent hopelessness around the world.

JED empowers teens and young adults by building resiliency and life skills, promoting social connectedness, and encouraging help-seeking and help-giving behaviors through our nationally recognized programs, digital channels, and partnerships, as well as through the media. JED strengthens schools by working directly with high schools, colleges, and universities — representing millions of students — to put systems, programs, and policies in place to create a culture of caring that protects student mental health, builds life skills, and makes it more likely that struggling students will seek help and be recognized, connected to care, and supported. We mobilize communities by providing education, training, and tools to families, friends, media, and others.

Practice-based digital learning to improve mental health and well-being in schools, campuses, and communities. Kognito role-play simulations enable organizations to rapidly build the capacity of educators and students to lead real-life conversations that change lives.

Practice-based digital learning to improve mental health and well-being in schools, campuses, and communities. Kognito role-play simulations enable organizations to rapidly build the capacity of educators and students to lead real-life conversations that change lives.

The Lifelines Prevention student curriculum (formerly known as the Lifelines Curriculum) is one component of Lifelines: Helping A Comprehensive Suicide Awareness and Responsiveness Program for Teens, a comprehensive, schoolwide suicide prevention program for middle and high schools. The goal of the overall Lifelines program is to promote a caring, competent school community in which help-seeking is encouraged and modeled and suicidal behavior is recognized as an issue that cannot be kept secret.

The U.S. has a youth mental health crisis. School mental health services help address the crisis. Through our School Mental Health Initiative, the MHTTC Networks aims to accelerate the implementations of effective mental health services in schools.

Educators and school personnel play a vital role in promoting mental health and well-being and identifying and responding to emerging mental illness in children and adolescents. However, they often have not received the education, training, and/or ongoing support needed to respond in the classroom.

At Minding Your Mind, we create experiences that open minds and show people they are not alone when they are struggling. Our group of young adult speakers, who have successfully and productively coped with their mental health challenges, share their stories of hope, recovery, and resilience.

My Life is Worth Living includes five powerful stories told over 20 episodes. In each episode, relatable teen characters wrestle with challenges that are all too familiar for many viewers and discover strategies to cope when it feels like their own thoughts are against them. Over the course of each character’s journey, they realize that life is worth living.

Neolth was built by education and health professionals, in partnership with 250 students.

Our comprehensive solution includes three versions of Neolth: our self-guided student app, our educator platform for classroom use, and our health analytics platform for counselors & administrators.

It is New Jersey’s free or low cost behavioral health system for kids up to age 21. It provides eligible youth with coordinated access to mental health
supports, substance use treatment and services for intellectual or developmental disabilities.

In November 2024, NJAMHAA launched a new campaign, Untold Stories You will read several success stories within these pages. These successes were realized by individuals who were fortunate enough to access the appropriate mental health and/or substance use treatment and supports they needed to assist them in reaching their goals of healthier and more productive lives. There are, unfortunately, so many untold stories – stories of those who are unable to access such services. They are tragically often counted among the statistics on suicides, hospitalizations, imprisonment and overdoses.

Created by the Society for the Prevention of Teen Suicide, Not My Kid: What Every Parent Should Know is an online learning experience that features videos of parents from culturally diverse backgrounds asking mental health professionals a variety of common questions about youth suicide. You may be interested in receiving information to help your child, a family member or a friend of your child, and Not My Kid provides this information from a variety of mental health professionals.

Not My Kid contains a variety of videos that assists parents, guardians and trusted adults in knowing the warning signs of youth suicide, explains how to have important conversations and provides valuable resources to help keep their children safe. It includes developmentally appropriate information for youth of all ages including Elementary, Middle and High School-aged youth and Young Adults.

Project YES (Youth Empowerment & Support) offers free, anonymous, brief, self-guided mental health tools for teens. YES empowers teens to learn new ways of dealing with stress while helping others do the same.

Project YES was designed with teens (ages 11-17) in mind, but people of all ages are welcome to try the tools in Project YES, anywhere and anytime.

Project YES is run by scientists at the Lab for Scalable Mental Health, with partners at University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, the University of Miami, Lebanese American University, and Ankara University.

Promly is a social enterprise that aims to unify a generation by empowering human connectedness and providing holistic support and education for GenZ in places they will naturally gravitate to, both online and offline.

Download in the App Store!

The QPR mission is to reduce suicidal behaviors and save lives by providing innovative, practical and proven suicide prevention training. The signs of crisis are all around us. We believe that quality education empowers all people, regardless of their background, to make a positive difference in the life of someone they know.

Our mission is to break the grip of emotional isolation that is killing our young people. We do this by expanding and delivering measurable, science-based programs that fill critical gaps and equip America’s youth with the skills they need to thrive.

We are a movement—an uprising of teens to help other teens. We’ve made it our mission to stop the suicide epidemic that’s taking the lives of our friends.

This toolkit assists high schools and school districts in designing and implementing strategies to prevent suicide and promote behavioral health. The toolkit includes tools to implement a multifaceted suicide prevention program that responds to the needs and cultures of students. Access the high school kit promotional flyer.

Sheppard Pratt is committed to providing education and resources to support clinicians, caregivers, and the broader community in understanding and addressing complex mental health challenges. Their educational series explores evidence-based strategies for topics such as managing difficult-to-treat depression and suicide prevention, offering valuable insights from leading experts in the field.

Each educational series is designed for mental health professionals, healthcare providers, and anyone invested in improving outcomes for individuals facing these critical issues. Whether you are seeking the latest research, practical interventions, or community-based approaches, these programs provide actionable knowledge to enhance care and support.

Available Educational Series:

• Difficult-to-treat depression: learn how to assess and manage patients whose depressive symptoms are not responding to traditional treatments.
• Suicide Prevention in Primary Care: learn to improve suicide screening and management through relevant clinical information, examples, and workflows.

Join Sheppard Pratt in advancing the conversation and improving care for those who need it most.

SOS Signs of Suicide is an affordable, evidence-based suicide prevention program that has demonstrated a 64% reduction in self-reported suicide attempts.

The Society for the Prevention of Teen Suicide has compiled a list of Crisis and informational resources for parents and caregivers.

Society for the Prevention of Teen Suicide is dedicated to increasing awareness, saving lives and reducing the stigma of suicide through specialized training programs and resources that empower teens, parents and educational leaders with the skills needed to help youth build a life of resiliency.

Soluna is an app that offers free, confidential mental health support to New Jersey teens ages 13 to 18. Access self-guided tools, connect with peers in a safe online community, or chat 1:1 with a professional. Get started anytime at SolunaApp.com/NewJersey.

Available for download on the App Store and Google Play.

When a school community experiences the death of a student, there is often the very human tendency to want to do something in memory of the deceased student. These memorials can range from spontaneous tributes piled at lockers or parking spaces to more permanent, lasting tributes like placing plaques in halls or planting trees or gardens in the student’s name.  There may also be ceremonies or assemblies that bring together members of the school community to share memories and grieve together.

As an educator, we know you often identify students in your classroom who, for one reason or another seem vulnerable or at risk. But how do you know if what you’re seeing is part of the normal ups and downs of adolescence or something more severe?

Resources for caregivers provided by Monmouth University, School of Social Work.

Are you feeling depressed, anxious or alone? Do you feel your family or friends can’t understand what you are going through? Do you feel like you are a burden? Do you have a friend or a loved one experiencing these feelings?

AFSP has partnered with the American Academy of Pediatrics to create several new resources for teens and their parents/caregivers.

Suicide CAN be prevented. This guide is meant to help you recognize signs of mental health concerns in yourself or your friends. It will also show you how to have important conversations that can help you get the right support.

Accurate data, up-to-date research, and knowledge of effective strategies and interventions are all essential to our ability to prevent suicide. This section provides information on the suicide problem and links to resources that can help you learn more.

Suicide Prevention: Step by Step was created through a partnership between Lines for Life and
the Willamette Education Service District.

Explaining suicide death to a child or teen can feel overwhelming and intimidating. As adults, we often want to protect them from the stigma and shame that can accompany such a death. Here are some tips for talking with children and teens about a suicide death and ways to support them in their grief.

As a parent, you can approach suicide prevention in the same way you do other safety or health issues for your children. By educating yourself, you can learn what puts kids at greatest risk for suicide – and what protects them most strongly.

Just released from the Action Alliance for Suicide Prevention

To support the shift to telehealth services in recent years, the Action Alliance produced a series of videos to facilitate the adoption of standard suicide risk screening practices in telehealth. The second video, launched on January 22, provides practical strategies for setting up virtual screening within an electronic health record portal and steps to take when virtual screening indicates that risk is present.

The Steve Fund is dedicated to the mental health and emotional well-being of students of color. Right at this moment, there are students of color who are failing academically, suffering emotionally and/OR in some cases are facing serious risk, because population-specific factors influencing mental health are too poorly understood and not acted upon.

TRAILS (Transforming Research into Action to Improve the Lives of Students) is working to make effective mental health services accessible to all students with school-based solutions that are cost-effective and sustainable.

Since 2000, the TLC has been providing support to communities affected by traumatic events such as homicide and illness; the most difficult being suicide.

​The TREP Project was launched in 2016 with a policy brief on the educational consequences of the chronic toxic stress of living in high crime communities. The TREP Project works to develop the individual and organizational capacity of educators and schools serving children growing up in neighborhoods that have high levels of toxic stress, such as violent crime, concentrated poverty, concentrated foster care involvement, and housing instability.

This newly designed online training consists of meetings and coursework over 4 weeks. The Umatter® for Schools Suicide Prevention national best practice program for suicide prevention was developed by the Center for Health and Learning. Umatter® can be adapted to state contexts and to meet statute requirements. The training has routinely been offered to school staff in grades 7-12, and we will also be including K-6 specific content.

AFSP supports increased awareness and promotion of mental health and suicide prevention resources on university and college campuses for faculty, staff, students, and their families.

“With all of the recent media coverage of stories about suicide, I find that it’s becoming more common for my middle school students to talk about suicide. How can I tell who is serious about it and who isn’t?”

Youth Aware of Mental health, also known as YAM, is a school-based program for young people ages 13 to 17, in which they learn about and explore the topic of mental health. YAM is an evidence-based program taking place in classrooms around the world. Students actively engage with the topic of mental health through role-play and student-led discussions.

Youth Mental Health First Aid is designed to teach parents, family members, caregivers, teachers, school staff, peers, neighbors, health and human services workers, and other caring citizens how to help an adolescent (age 12-18) who is experiencing a mental health or addictions challenge or is in crisis. Youth Mental Health First Aid is primarily designed for adults who regularly interact with young people.

In recognition of the current youth mental health crisis, the New Jersey Department of Children and Families has two public service announcements it is sharing this month to acknowledge September as Suicide Awareness Month and the start of a new school year. The first is our new PSA, illustrating how youth can seek help.  This PSAs was created with youth participation and parents also participated in the creation of the CSOC PSA.