Wednesday, January 15, 2025
1/15/2025
The City of Trenton is in serious distress and grapples with high unemployment, poverty, domestic violence, mental and behavioral health needs, lower education attainment and high dropout rates. These issues impact the mental health needs of youth within the community which nearly every aspect of life within the city. This proposal to saturate the City of Trenton with Youth Mental Health First Aid training is a comprehensive approach which relies heavily on collaboration with community partners. This proposal includes awareness, training, and referral education across a number of constituents to reach the broadest possible audience, saturating the community with trained YMHFA responders as well as a cadre of trainers from various community partners to ensure continuity after the completion of this project. A number of individuals will participate in train-the-trainer program to become Youth Mental Health First Aid Instructors. Those strategically selected individuals will then complete trainings in cross-agency pairs for various constituents in the catchment area including, but not limited to: law enforcement personnel, parents, teachers, child care providers, afterschool volunteers, college student volunteers, future teachers, and faith leaders and congregation members. The Project Director and program staff will serve as a clearinghouse for mobilizing 20 certified YMHFA trainers in various locations throughout the catchment area, setting up logistical details and developing recruitment plans to ensure project goals and objectives are met. Specific goals include building the capacity of adults working with youth to appropriately detect and respond to children with mental health issues, expanding the integration of prevention services provided by agencies serving youth and their families in the Greater Trenton Area, increasing the capacity of partners to provide for the continuation of YMHFA beyond the grant period, and reducing the stigma associated with seeking mental health services. Data will be collected throughout the entire project for both formative and summative evaluation and related to the stated goals and objectives of the project. As data is collected, it will be analyzed and shared with stakeholders during monthly advisory board meetings and will include data related to the number of individuals certified as instructors and the number of adults trained in any given month, as well as the number of future YMHFA trainings scheduled. Data presented at monthly meetings will be used to inform training and recruitment procedures.
HHS’ Tracking Accountability in Government Grants System (TAGGS) website provides access to detailed descriptions of grants, loans, aggregated direct payments and other types of financial assistance awarded by the HHS Operating Divisions (OPDIVs) and the Office of the Secretary Staff Divisions (STAFFDIVs).