Music is a tool students use to communicate, especially feelings. Oak Park Middle School was able to harness that, and put some structure to it. The counselor, band director, and mental health liaison facilitated discussions around a middle school score that was written about mental health. They were able to use the music to talk about mental and emotional health. Watch the videos below to see how successful the project was.

The No Hate tour, sponsored by the Marine Corps, is an incredibly impactful program that uses the energy and excitement of action sports to promote bullying prevention tools and techniques to students in a relatable, peer-to-peer manner. Due to a rise in online bullying and mental health struggles among teens, Lake Minneola High School scheduled this presentation to help deliver the importance of anti-bullying, learn how to face bullying situations, and to strengthen their school climate.

Umatilla Middle School had a showcase for incoming 5th graders and current 6th/7th graders. The Mental Health Liaison set up a table where information was available to students, parents, and guardians. One important aspect of the table was "Take What You Need" sticky notes. The liaison wanted to make sure that encouragement is always provided to others and that individuals understand that she is their biggest advocate on campus.

During the first month of May, You're Not Alone (YNA) student ambassadors at Tavares High School interacted with their peers at Mental Health Awareness Booths. In addition, they organized a Creative Arts Event and "Feelings Friday" Presentation where local therapists came in to share healthy ways to express emotions.

Students at Sawgrass Bay learned how to take care of their mental health by spending time at four different stations (coloring, fidget, puzzle, and yoga).

Clermont Elementary School enjoyed several classroom lessons on the importance of mental health and conflict resolution.

Windy Hill celebrates Mental Health Awareness and pledges to Stop the Stigma!

Tavares Elementary School created a kindness chain where they wrote a random act of kindness on each link. Kindness was the focus for Mental Health Awareness.

The Paws Therapy Dogs go to Eustis Elementary School once a month and offer students information on the difference between a therapy dog and a service dog. They also teach students how to safely approach dogs and how to understand the importance of adopting, fostering or donating time or pet food to the local humane society.

At Eustis Elementary School, we Celebrated Mental Health Awareness the week of May 16th - 20th. Teachers received MINT goodies and goody bags and a flyer with stickers, and bookmarks promoting self-care. Student received daily announcements about mental health and each student received a green goody along with stickers that promoted mental health.

The Counseling Department and Mental Health Liaison at ERMS created a "Back to Basics" bulletin board to align with Mental Health America's theme for this year. They also highlighted various emotions one may deal with, who to go to for help and ways to cope.

Lake County Virtual School highlighted the importance of mental health awareness through the weekly mental health themes, shared "Back to Basics" fact sheets and a creative arts contest. Alisha Grill, the Mental Health Liaison at LCVS initiated a drawing/essay contest to engage students in the topic of mental health. Alisha states, "each student who participated was entered in a weekly drawing for prizes. and a grand prize at the end of the month."

Shannon Ramsuchit, 11th grade LCVS student, was the grand prize winner. Here is one of the essays she submitted.

"Food choices and nutrition affect mental health by depending on the quality of food that you eat. It also affects your physical health too, which makes your guts communicate to your normal brain by sending chemical hormones through neurotransmitters. The main important nutrients for mental health are: Omega-3 fatty acids, B-Group vitamins, Also, there are harmless bacteria and viruses that live in your guts in this inner area called the microbiome and they eat the nutritious foods that you recently ate which can protect your brain and keep your microbiome healthier.

Exercise affects mental health by benefitting aspects of health and preventing physical and mental health symptoms by staying active as long as you can(especially more than 1 hour). Also, exercising every day improves self-esteem and brain function well in order to lessen withdrawal and stress. Also, working out for hours can be optional, but it’s best to work out for about 15 minutes. According to that, 1 hour of exercise can easily prevent stress and other negative emotions to burn off some energy.

Sleep affects mental health by depending on how long you rest for. It makes yourself take a break every evening(about 8-10 hours) and sometimes every afternoon(about 2-3 hours). Sleep normally plays a role in your current feelings, learning, making new memories, good organ health and renewed immune system. Like when you get up after sleeping for hours, you’ll be freshly minded, being able to learn new things.

Stress management sometimes becomes a normal part of life for example, too much responsibility or not sleeping enough. But the good news is stress comes and goes quickly so you can mentally return back to your normal self and it’s like cheering yourself up, especially doing activities that you enjoy doing.

Coping skills are used to reduce difficult emotions. Sometimes it doesn’t work for everyone, but if you cope a few tries and then as many times as possible, it’ll make you feel better again. For example, like chatting with a friend online like calling, texting, or FaceTiming with him/her.

Building a support system affects mental health by involving people that are related to you to support you during times of difficulty which protects your long-term mental health. According to that, humans are very social and their minds have wired connections to each other especially while having conversations. 3 different ways of how to find your social people are: to connect with others with shared activities and interests, considering community services, and focusing on quality relationships."

Shannon Ramsuchit

11th Grade Student

Lake County Virtual School

The Zones of Regulations provide a common language and compassionate framework to support social and emotional interaction among students and teachers, as well as supports positive mental health and skill development. It was a pleasure to be able to implement this tier 1 intervention schoolwide in collaboration with our PASS teacher.