The Mom Building the Largest Youth Mental Health Summit in US History

Chanda Spates went from needing a babysitter for her suicidal son to building the largest youth mental health summit in US history.

Every 11 minutes, someone dies by suicide in America. One in four are children.

Chanda's solution? Do something every 11 minutes to save them.

Her Olympic Stadium event on May 23rd-24th will be streamed globally on gaming and music platforms—meeting kids exactly where they are.

This is how one mom's crisis became America's mental health revolution.

Chapters

• 0:03 Welcome Back & Part Two Setup
• 0:06 Why Prevention Beats Crisis Care
• 2:12 After-School Program: Scalable Foundations
• 2:43 Youth-Led Media: Podcasts, Radio, App
• 3:16 Peer Power: Building Support Networks
• 4:17 Purpose Over Pain: Future Focus
• 5:28 Hands-On Projects and Certifications
• 6:13 The Summit at the Olympic Center
• 6:49 Gaming Meets Wellness: Fun, Stigma-Free
• 8:01 Lived Experience and Urgency
• 10:44 The Every 11 Minutes Campaign
• 14:32 How to Join and Final Links

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:03

Awesome. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back. This is the part two of Rice and the Ashes. I am stoked. Shamanda, we spoke on the first part about your experience with as a mother and going through bullying and watching your son go through it. But more importantly, we spoke about the happiness that you've created, not just for other people, but a completely different directive. And calling the BS out in a lot of these places. You've got a lot going on in the world of you at the moment, projects over here, left and over all over the place. What is your main focus at this present moment in time? And how can people get hold of you, understand more of what's in your world?

SPEAKER_01: 0:54

Okay, so thank you. Thank you for having me back on. We are building an ecosystem for youth mental wellness. That's the best way that I can describe it and simplify it, because it's actually three, if not four, things. We're looking to support youth in the ways that they need to be supported by first building stigma-free programs, enrichment programs, after school programs, so that we get kids right there where they are and give them those tools before they encounter the bullying, before they encounter whatever it is that's going to go on. Can we always do it before? Of course not. But we have programs in schools, counselors in schools, although there's not enough, but there's not a lot of focus on preventive measures, which means we have a lot of kids that fall through the cracks. And if we can get that preventive piece in, then I think we won't be bottlenecking so much at the crisis point. And it also provides some relief for the counselors and teachers and parents that are dealing with the critical problems or the critical situation. So that's first thing is having this after school program as a baseline program to provide it. And that's scalable. We are doing it here in Charlotte, but we can come anywhere you need us to be. We need a facility, a space, and about 25 laptops. There you go. The second piece of that is within that after school program, we empower youth to be their own champions so that they can actually have something to say in shaping what that looks like. So in our afterschool program, the kids are running their own podcast station, their own radio station. We have our own radio network, we have our own podcasts, and we are in the midst of developing our app, which will allow it to be more accessible to kids. So now we are making it fun. It's addressing it where they are with what they want to. How many kids want to be on a podcast or they're on social media and they're doing the TikTok videos? We're just putting what they need in a way that resonates with them. Then you go from there in this ecosystem, is the ability to reinforce it because I can say something to my son, but if you say it to him, it just hits different. You know what I'm saying? Because it's not mama saying it. So that's where this is. It's kids cheering on kids and being supportive and teaching that empathy and that kindness and that network, having them understand how to build a supportive peer network. Because sometimes you don't get it from home. How do I build a circle around myself to protect myself? And that's what we need to know, even as adults. So we are helping them learn how to build that. And then the other part is we are empowering them, and that's where a lot of programs that I don't call them competitors because they're not, they're just not fair for us to call them that. So I won't do that to them. But we build it so that we are igniting them for the future. Think about it this way, and I know we're gonna have a little bit of time, but there are two studies that show when people have careers that they find purpose in and that they are proud of themselves for being in that career, we find that there is a dramatic reduction in suicidiation and mental illness and things of that nature because of that pride point and that sense of purpose in their lives when people don't have a sense of purpose, more instances of depression and things of that nature. So getting kids into what we call a future focus, getting that mindset on building their future. Now they are replacing this southern ideation behavior with a future focus where they're building and envisioning their future, which means it's all it's I can't say it's impossible, but it's very hard to have this sousa idea ideation mentality when you're constantly driving yourself forward and building a bright future. So, what we do is a couple of different things. We have these hands-on projects that they can actually work on together collaboratively that help other kids themselves, but then we're building that in these projects, they're getting certified in things like web development. There, we have a group of kids now working on an album. We have another group of kids that is building a video game that addresses mental health, so they're learning these things. So now when you think about from a community standpoint, we have a pipeline of mental resilient, technology savvy future leaders of their community because they're learning how to do it now. They're learning how to put the events on, they're helping us plan the event that we have coming up. We have an event coming up in May, May 23rd and 24th at the Olympic Center. It will be the largest youth mental health summit in US history. It will be live streamed from the Olympic Center, televised on gaming platforms, which again where kids are, and music platforms. And it's where they're playing a game, but in the midst of those games, when it's not their turn to play, they're doing these wellness challenges all across. So by the time we finish, we've got kids that are ready to take on whatever those challenges might be. So this is proactive and preventive, but it's also fun. That's stigma free. That's how we make sure that the next school shooting doesn't necessarily have to happen. The next child that is considering suicide, their friend next to them can say, you know what, that's probably not a good idea. Let me help you get to someone that can help talk you through this. Those are the conversations that we need to have, that we need our children and our peers having with each other because that's who they share it with. They're saying it online. How many stories have you seen of kids unaliving themselves on social media? It's not the social media's fault, it just happens to be that's where they are. And if we don't put the intervention there, then we're not doing enough.

SPEAKER_00: 7:38

What you're speaking into now is incredible. And I want to add to that, if I may, when and um I I try to unalive myself a few times very unsuccessfully for many different reasons. But it's also in my own experience going through that myself. I always cry for help. And my memory of it was the reason I was wanting the attention is I didn't know where to look, I didn't know how to ask, I didn't know how to have them conversations. I wasn't certainly back then emotionally intelligent enough to even address it. I didn't even know that I had a problem, I just thought this was a normal thing. But I can never imagine what these children are going through in that capacity. And why would they even? I know why, but the mentality of going to that level within themselves and thinking they're not worthy to be around, they're not loved. That's just fucking wrong. And I'm that this is I can say it because it is what it is. It is wrong on so many levels. But you're addressing it at its core. Not only have you got the support of some very influential people in the background, brands, individuals, music companies, etc., etc. Entrepreneurs have a skill set that most others don't. And that's they find the drive and willpower when there is none. And it is a driving skill set that the normal society of people who are go out on the 9 to 5 or the shift work, take the train, take the car, come home, whatever time they come home, six, seven, and spend the night with their family and really, really miserable, just call it what it is, because they don't have that the drive, they don't have the forward look. But you've uncovered something here that is very remarkable and next level. Top of that, you now use it to impact potentially billions of people, and that's a real number. If you're thinking now billions of people, yes, I'm saying it billions of people, because it's not just the US. We're talking Europe, we're talking Australia, Asia, different cultures, same challenges. It's the same thing, but do in it in the in these in different environments, different and they manifest in different ways, but the core the root cause of it isn't changed. And you're attacking the root cause and getting in with the people that actually matter. And Olympic Stadium, that's a pretty big achievement. That's something to kind of shout from the rooftops about, and that's next level shit. I was like, say that what?

SPEAKER_01: 10:40

Yeah, it's a problem that so many people identify with. 60% of the US population knows someone that was directly impacted by suicide. That's US Surgeon General report. So if 60% of us know someone that either tried it or was successful at it, that's huge.

SPEAKER_00: 11:03

Yeah, I know both.

SPEAKER_01: 11:06

We have to understand the magnitude of that. The other thing is like with our every 11 minutes campaign, this is ingenious. This is what I was talking about with not me in genius, but the kids. We have this after school program, the kids are doing the little podcast, and they pick up the topics and all that kind of stuff. So it's really relatable with them. But we in order for them to participate, we have we do QPR with them. So they're trained on what they can say, what they can't say, and what the different strategies are so they understand what to do and say as well. So, long story short, we're doing the QPR training and we're training them about how many people attempt suicide every year and how many lives are lost. So there are 1.7 million suicide attempts every year just in the US. 1.7 million. That's insane. That should be said more often because what the stat that you will see a lot of times in print and media and news is that 51,000 people die a year from suicide. And that number is 11 every 11 minutes, one person has passed away due to this thing. But one in four of those are children, 18 and under. So that's why it's so important. But when we were talking to the kids and we're saying, hey, every 11 minutes someone is dying from this. And if you think about it, we actually put that in context for them. We said, Okay, watch this little short YouTube video, and we played a little video for them, and every 11 minutes we had a little alarm or delg law so they could see how often that is because you have to make it make sense for kids, right? So one of the kids said if every 11 minutes we're losing someone, why don't we just do something every 11 minutes to tell them don't do that? It's oversimplified. But that's what kids think. So if every 11 minutes we can have another kid telling a kid or another adult or someone that they in the influencer, someone that they game with, it's a high-powered person of influence and they see other kids doing it because now it doesn't look like I'm the oddball out, we're removing the stigma. If we can put that in the gaming platform, in the music outlet, in Spotify, in Apple Music, in whatever, wherever they're hanging out, if every 11 minutes we just had an 11-second video that said, you know what, you're not by yourself, you're not alone. Other people going through it too, and hang on and play one more day. So that's where we came up with the tagline is play and stay live. So alive, live, live, energetic, stay and play live. So we are challenging kids to do 11-second videos, and we're challenging businesses and influencers and celebrities and whoever else they might look up to reinforce that because when they see the person that they emulate and that they look up to saying the same thing, it hits different than mom's saying it.

unknown: 14:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 14:27

I'm just blown away by this conversation for many different reasons. I want to wrap it up, but you are so inspirational. I am true when I say this, I really mean it, and every time I say it, I do mean it, especially when I say it's now. It is a privilege and an honor to spend time with somebody that knows, understands, and I'm gonna say an in an innerstanding of what this is. For those people who heard me say that phrase before, you under you know what it means. Understanding is a concept of intelligence. Yeah, I get that. And in a standing is something that is much deeper and it's soul resonation because you've lived the journey yourself, and this is why I love this podcast. I love interviewing people, having these conversations, and sharing your message. Thank you. Where can people find you? As in obviously on LinkedIn, because that's where we hang out mostly. Is there a website people go to? What's the easiest way to get in touch?

SPEAKER_01: 15:38

Okay, so it's info at flourish.foundation, and that's the email address. And the website is flourish.foundation, that's a nonprofit, to join the every11 minutes campaign. It's every the number11minutes.org. And you can actually make a video, encourage some kids when you submit your video. You are doing so, understand that we're gonna put it where it needs to be to help save a life. And you'll see other kids' videos and all those kind of things. But Flourish Foundation Project is the name of our business. Flourish.foundation is the website, and our campaign is every11minutes.org.

SPEAKER_00: 16:20

And just to reiterate, all the links are going to be below. I really do suggest and I encourage anybody who's listening to this. Firstly, share the message, both episodes, because they're awesome. Shandra's awesome, and get this message out there to prevent other people's going, other people going through the same tragedies as Shanda had to go and endure. And many millions of other, many thousands, certainly hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of other people have to go through every single year. I'm Baz Porter. Shanda, thank you so much for your time. This is Rice from the Ashes Podcast. Remember, you are the miracle. Go and make it happen with someone else today. See you soon.