As I write this, 60 students from Laurentian University’s School of Education and 90 teachers from the Sudbury area, including Manitoulin Island are taking SafeTALK training. This it truly a monumental day for suicide awareness and prevention.
After everyone has completed their SafeTALK training, a panel discussion hosted by CBC Radio (Sudbury) personality Megan Thomas will take place.
Check out the forum as we begin our discussion in a few hours.
Not talking about it isn’t working.
This workshop should be mandatory for all school of education teachers across Ontario. No. Across Canada. It has the potential to save lives. As a future teacher, I feel better equipped with the essential tools I will need to address a student who may be in great need of a conversation that society seems to dance around. Thank you for an informative and eye opening day. I should also probably thank all the presenters in advance because with all of those teacher learners at Safe-TALK? There is no telling how many students’ lives will be saved.
-Ella
Wow! What an amazing day. First and foremost a big thank you to our SafeTALK trainers Jim, Janice, Greg, Linda and Heather. Thank you for making the time to come to Laurentian University and make this day happen. Another thank you has to go out to Jan Buley and Gayle Adams-Carpino who did a tremendous job advocating SafeTALK and organizing the days events. Lastly, thank you Scott Chisholm for being the main driving force behind today and bringing SafeTALK to Laurentian.
Today I, along with my professional year peers at Laurentian and members of my community were equipped with proper “tools” to help prevent losses to suicide. (Fun Fact: The professional year student teaching group at Laurentian is the first teacher group in Ontario to graduate with SafeTALK training) SafeTALK provided us with what to look for and listen for in people that may be experiencing thoughts of suicide. The training itself was as Scott referred to as “gatekeeper” training which taught us how to get people from a point of being at risk to a trained professional.
With the dialogue that came out of today, I can say with confidence that Laurentian University and the local community has begun to create a safe community that is comfortable talking about suicide. I say “begun” because this dialogue and conversation needs to continue. Also,in addition to talking about suicide, we need to ask ourselves, what we are going to do about it.
Today allowed for fantastic opportunities to talk about suicide and as mentioned above, this conversation needs to continue. With the help of Scott and his team, Laurentian has become an example for Universities across Canada. With our leadership we can continue this conversation!
Thanks again to everyone that was involved in this “Big Day for Suicide Prevention at Laurentian University”,
Ben Skillings
Professional Year Student at Laurentian University
What a great day! Ben summed it up perfectly in my opinion. Thanks to everyone who made this happen and especially to Scott for igniting a flame within myself and my peers; a flame which will only continue to grow and get bigger while we all continue to use the tools we have acquired and also incourage others to be trained in SafeTALK as we enter the working world in a few months. Let’s get talking about suicide, and more importantly, let’s NEVER stop talking about it. Keep having those “courageous conversations”!
Thank you, thank you, thank you
Ali