At the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention our fiscal year runs from July 1st to June 30th. In June we like to take a look back at what we've accomplished throughout the year. This serves two purposes:
- To see how well we've done.
- To see what what we need to improve upon in our work.
This year, I wanted to share some information with all of you; our supporters, volunteers, our people that make us who we are. We realize that none of the work we do would be possible if it wasn't for your donations, your time, your interest and your passion for suicide prevention.
Our walks are our biggest fundraisers. We rely on that income to fund our support programs, education, research and advocacy. In New Jersey we are fortunate to have 15 Out of the Darkness Community Walks that take place every Fall in an 8 week period. So how did our walks do? We had almost
9,500 registered walkers
and
raised almost $870,000
! This was a growth of more than $102,000 from our 2017 walk season! THANK YOU!!! While we definitely had a successful year, we did learn what more we need to do better for the coming walk seasons. We learned that we need to get people involved with the planning our our walks, we need more volunteers and more corporate sponsors. It seems that with corporate sponsorship, it's difficult to get a company involved, if they haven't lost someone directly to suicide. We need to make them aware of the statistics. Suicide is the 10th leading cause of death in the US, over 47,000 people are dying annually by suicide. Suicide is everyone's business and it is preventable.
Our Spring events generate money for the chapters as well. Each year we host a
Hike for Hope
and
Ride to Fight Suicide
, along with Out of the Darkness Campus Walks. Although these are smaller events than our Community Walks, we are grateful for the supporters of them. This past year
The College of New Jersey
had their first Campus Walk (and passed their goal), and
Rowan University
passing their goal for
their second year. We love that the students want to make a difference on their campus. They are the future leaders in suicide prevention and awareness. Click on the event if you want to make a donation, donations accepted until 6/30/19.
For programming, we did
safeTALK trainings
whenever they were requested. For next fiscal year, we added more money to budget for these trainings, so we can provide it whenever it is requested. We budgeted for
Mental Health First Aid
in all our counties, because we know that community members want this 8 hr. course.
Talk Saves Lives
(TSL) is a fantastic community-based presentation that covers the general scope of suicide, the research on prevention, and what people can do to fight suicide. Attendees learn the risk and warning signs of suicide, and how together, we can help prevent it. We provided the presentation to schools, businesses, hospitals, individual groups, colleges, small businesses. We realized that we need more trainers for TSL so we will be setting up training's for presenters. We continue to provide our
More Than Sad
films for all the schools in all the counties we cover. Our
It's Real: College Students and Mental Health
has been distributed to many high schools and colleges throughout the state.
For
Advocacy
,
our National Public Policy team gives our volunteers the tools they need to advocate for suicide prevention at both the state and federal levels. On June 24th, we hosted the New Jersey State Capitol Day. In the beginning of June, we sent volunteers to Washington, D.C. for the AFSP Annual Advocacy Forum.
Overall, this past fiscal year was a good one for our chapter. Thank you for your continued support. If you have any questions about the work that we are doing, or want to bring a program to your community, please don't hesitate to reach out to me directly. I hope to see you at an event!
Elizabeth Clemens
New Jersey Area Director
(908) 514-6028