Jaheem Herrera. Photo credit: smokenmirrors_photo/photobucket

Jaheem Herrera’s Suicide Inspired Lawmakers To Beef Up Georgia’s School Bullying Policies

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Jaheem Herrera’s Suicide Inspired Lawmakers To Beef Up Georgia’s School Bullying Policies, His Mother Says She’s Still Fighting For Justice

It’s been two years since Masika Bermudez lost her only son Jaheem Herrera, but the heart-wrenching emotions are still raw as if he died yesterday. “It was like a bad dream, you know,” says the metro Atlanta mother, tears welling in her eyes. “You have your son there after school and in a blink of an eye, he’s not there anymore. The last thing I can remember about my son is with a big smile on his face when I was looking through his report card and then to see him lifeless afterwards. That’s the last image I have of my son every time I close my eyes.”

Jaheem was just 11-years-old when she found him hanged in a closet in their Decatur, Ga., apartment in April of 2009.

Silence is the Ally of Suicide, Send it Packing

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Three years ago my brother took his own life. For him it became the only option he could imagine that would end his depression. He left behind many grief-stricken friends, family and relatives who still struggle to understand. We’re far from alone in our grief. Tonight somewhere in America a mother buries her head in her pillow as she sobs out her grief to the heavens.

A Minnesota School District’s Struggle over Bullying and Gay Rights

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In a front page story, the New York Times explores the problem of bullying and a controversial school policy concerning sexual orientation in a school district in suburban Minneapolis. The piece details a long struggle between advocates for homosexual students and Christian conservatives over how sexual orientation should be taught in schools. It also reports on a lawsuit filed against the Anoka-Hennepin School District claiming, in part, that district policy requiring teachers to be “neutral” on the question of sexual orientation has helped to bring about a hostile environment for gay and lesbian students and therefore increasing the number of incidents of bullying. The suit was brought on behalf of the students by the Southern Poverty Law Center and the National Center for Lesbian Rights. News of the suit comes after reports that the Department of Justice is in the midst of a civil rights investigation of on-going harassment of gay and lesbian students in the the district of some 38,000.

Rhode Island Lands $480,000 to Fund Suicide Prevention

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The Rhode Island Youth Suicide Prevention Project (RIYSPP) will receive $480,000 to implement suicide prevention programs in select community organizations and public schools throughout the state, U.S. Sen. Jack Reed (D-Rhode Island) announced on Thursday. Suicide is believed to be the second leading cause of death among college students and third leading cause among youth age 10 to 24, according to the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention and the Centers for Disease Control's  2009 Youth Risk Behavior Survey. “Many young people who commit suicide have a treatable mental illness, but they don't get the help they need,” Reed said in a press release. “This grant will provide critical resources for prevention and outreach efforts in Rhode Island to help reach at-risk youth before it is too late.”

The grant will provide the RIYSPP with necessary resources to screen, identify and refer at-risk youth, and launch a media campaign to help educate adults about warning signs and how best to respond. Currently RIYSPP operates in six communities throughout the state, but will soon provide technical assistance to the Rhode Island National Guard and state's Veterans ' Administration in an effort to reach military personal and their families.

Suicide: A Preventable Epidemic in Young Adults

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Teenagers and college students live in tumultuous times. Physical changes, high school graduation, going off to college, moving away from the parents — all of these things can cause personality and mood changes in young adults. So how does one know the difference between “normal” bouts of depression, sadness and erratic behavior, and what could potentially be a red flag for suicidal tendencies? Every 15 minutes (about the amount of time that it takes to down a cup of coffee) one person will commit suicide, according to The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. Many of these deaths could have been prevented by intervention from those close to the victims, but often the warning signs were ignored because the subject is awkward, according to Mary Ann Camann, PhD, an associate professor at the WellStar School of Nursing at Kennesaw State University near Atlanta.

Helping Kids with Substance Abuse Grant

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The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s Center for Mental Health Services is offering grants for Expansion of the Comprehensive Community Mental Health Services for Children and their Families. The grants' purpose is development of a comprehensive strategic plan to improve and expand services provided by systems of care for kids. These systems will address substance abuse problems, serious emotional disturbances and families undergoing this pressure. The aim of this grant is to help reduce suicide attempts, enhance contact with police and to improve school attendance. The deadline for this grant is June 2, 2011.

Facebook Application Targets Cyberbullying

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A new “Find Help” application on Facebook may make it easier for teens to not only report cyberbullying but also to find support organizations. Mashable.com reports that a company called SafetyWeb.com,has introduced the new app to address growing concerns about teen safety on the social networking site. According to CBC news, the “Find Help” application is similar to an online list of emergency phone numbers. When a child clicks on the application, he or she is directed to phone numbers and links for reporting incidents. This also sends kids to organizations like the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children’s CyberTipline, the National Suicide Prevention Hotline and Facebook’s abuse reporting process. Since 2003 there have been at least 12 teenagers who commited suicide because they had been bullied online.

Ken Trump: Bullycide

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Does bullying cause suicide? You would think so if you read and hear some of the headlines, comments, and advocacy by anti-bullying law special interests following several suicides completed by youth who were reported victims of chronic bullying at school. I certainly do not question whether these kids were bullied.  I do not question whether the bullying added significant stress to the lives of these kids and others who are chronically bullied.  And I definitely do not minimize the seriousness of the losses of these innocent kids’ lives. But I am also not convinced that bullying onto itself is the sole cause of teens taking their own life.  Being “bullied to death” makes quite a media headline and soundbite.  But does it accurately reflect the sole cause of death implied by the use of such a phrase? I can see where chronic bullying could be the last straw in cases where deeper mental health issues exist with an individual, driving the individual over-the-top to completion of suicide.