Yorkshire-Based Trust Marks Mental Health Day

A leading academies trust in the north of England has marked World Mental Health Day by holding events across its academies.

Outwood Grange Academies Trust, which consists of over 25,000 children across 32 academies, marked the day across the Trust with a series of events designed to spread awareness of the issue.

The Trust recently launched its mental wellbeing strategy, which is focussed on ensuring that all students, and staff, are fully supported. The strategy will help create a supportive, non-judgmental culture within the Outwood family based on comprehensive education, training and support to raise awareness of the issue of mental wellbeing.

Julie Slater, Chief Executive (Secondary) at Outwood, said: “At Outwood, we are determined to ensure we fully support our staff and students and that is why we are implementing our new mental wellbeing strategy. 

“As part of this, we are delighted to support World Mental Health Day across the Trust to help raise awareness of this important issue in every Outwood academy.”

Across the Outwood family, the academies have embraced the #HelloYellow campaign run by the UK’s leading charity fighting for young people’s mental health, Young Minds. 

As part of the #HelloYellow campaign, students across the Trust wore yellow on World Mental Health Day, showing everyone at their academy that they are not alone with their mental wellbeing.

Many academies across the Trust also launched ‘Chocolate & Chat’ to promote positive mental wellbeing within the Trust. 

The purpose of ‘Chocolate & Chat’ is give students five minutes together to discuss their own experiences and how they work on their mental wellbeing, all while sharing some chocolate. 

Julie added: “We are keen for our students to understand that it is okay to not be okay and that there is absolutely no need for them to keep things to themselves. There will always be someone available to them to talk to and to help work with them on their mental wellbeing.”

Outwood has also been supporting the Public Health England, ground-breaking mental health campaign, Every Mind Matters.

Every Mind Matters is Public Health England’s first national mental health campaign and encourages everyone to take action to look after their own, and others’ mental health and wellbeing. The campaign has received widespread support and has run from 7th October.