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Organizer's Guidelines

ORGANIZER’S GUIDELINES

Individuals and organizations that initiate the literary project in their community must sign a Letter of Understanding and be sure it is on file at the APA Alliance if they want to participate in the national level of the project.

The APA Alliance works closely with chapters of the American Medical Association, American Medical Association Alliance, chapters of National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI), mental health associations, school nurses organizations and parent teacher associations.

A list of mental health resources can be found on the APA Alliance website.

“Secrets” is funded at the national level only. Organizations are financially responsible for their own implementation of the project at the local and state level.

Below are some guidelines and strategies that may be helpful as you organize the literary project for your community.

  1. Community Contacts:
    Involving like-minded organizations will bring strength and commitment to the project. This will also help by adding volunteer judges, providing potentially several venues for the award ceremony and addressing mental health concerns from a collaborate position.
  2. School District:
    Identify the school hierarchy. The school superintendent, director of curriculum, director of school safety and health, and principal will become important advocates as the essay project evolves. Experience indicates contact with the English teacher, life skills teacher or creative writing instructors have made the project successful in their school.
  3. County Level Judges
    • 1st Tier: English, Social Studies, Life Skills – teachers that integrate the project into their curriculum and select the top five entries in both divisions from their school.
    • 2nd Tier: Enlist additional volunteers from your community contacts. (These judges would receive the sample letter, criteria and rating scale found on the website.)
    • 3rd Tier: Community leaders: Directors or presidents of local medical societies, public health, TV anchors, juvenile justice judges, city council members, local legislators, health reporters.
    • Each entry should be read by at least three people. Experience has shown that most judges should not receive more than 15 entries. So you will need to enlist as many judges as necessary for the task. Fifteen entries will take about 1 hour to complete.
  4. State Judges
    Each community is allowed to send its best three entries in each division. If there is no state coordination and several counties have participated, your organization should select the top three essays in each division to send to national.
  5. Award Ceremony
    Varies by community and funding. Many communities celebrate in conjunction with an established venue (mental health community awards, educational programs, PTA events, etc.) The options are limitless. Whatever opportunity exists or you create, always include the school librarian. The school librarian has been underutilized as a resource to students when they seek mental health resources. This will also be an opportunity to work on mental health literacy within your community.

Typically winners receive a gift certificate and certificate of recognition for their efforts.

Award Grantors – some ideas:

  • 1st Tier: County: Mayor, council members, principals, juvenile justice judge, child advocate, community leader
  • 2nd Tier: State: Governor, Lt. Governor, presidents of state service organizations

Involving legislators and health reporters adds another dimension to the project.

Example: In one large community, several excellent entries addressed eating disorders. It was a problem familiar to the school nurse, child and adolescent psychiatrists and pediatricians. There was nowhere to send these young people for help. Enlisting health reporters and legislators as judges, the problem became public and pressure was on from the community to find/fund a program to help these young people. And they did!