The Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA) Club hosted a “lifeguard workshop” in Trailer 6 open for all students to attend after school on Dec. 19. The workshop was held to promote the awareness of teen suicides.
“Their focus will be what students can do to notice warning signs of possible suicide, and who to go to when they suspect a friend is depressed or contemplating suicide,” ESOL teacher and GSA sponsor Bethany Slingerland said.
The Trevor Project started out as a movie in 1998 that HBO picked up and aired on their television channels. The producers wanted to create a hotline for teenagers, especially teenagers who were either gay, straight, or bisexual who were contemplating suicide.
The project has morphed into a 24-hour hotline that remains completely anonymous and anyone can call. Other features that come with the project include “Trevor Space” which is a MySpace page for the program, “Trevor Chat” which is a chat room for teenagers to anonymously get help, and Education Workshops where people can be trained for how to deal with situations like this.
“I think this has been very beneficial, because if you dont already know where to go if you were feeling all these emotions, even suicide, you have these hotlines” sophomore Samira Abdulkadir said.
The representative for the Trevor Project had the students list characteristics that stereotypically pertain to each gender. Then, the students listed names that each gender was called if they pertained a characteristic in the other genders box. Other activities included recognizing the signs that people show when they’re suicidal and things you can do to prevent them.
“I learned how to see if someone has suicidal thoughts and how to help people who do, even if I dont know them personally,” sophomore Carlos Valenzuela said.
