Children’s Mental Health Awareness Day 2011
This year, the national theme for Awareness Day focuses on building resilience in young children dealing with trauma.
Communities around the country will participate by holding their own Awareness Day events. These events may focus either on the national theme or a theme adapted to the specific populations a local community serves.
The national event in Washington, DC, will open with an art exhibit sponsored by the American Art Therapy Association at the prestigious Shakespeare Theatre-Harman Center for the Arts in Washington, DC, and continue with a tribute to youth who dealt with trauma in their childhood and who built on their resilience.
Last year, on Awareness Day 2010, more than 1,000 sites held Awareness Day events and nearly 11,000 children and youth participated. In addition, SAMHSA presented a special achievement award to Dr. T. Berry Brazelton for his work with infants and young children.
National Children’s Mental Health Awareness Day is a key strategy of the Caring for Every Child’s Mental Health Campaign. Part of SAMHSA’s Public Awareness and Support Strategic Initiative, the campaign seeks to raise awareness about the importance of children’s mental health and that positive mental health is essential to a child’s healthy development from birth.
For more information, visit http://www.samhsa.gov/children.
- Integrate mental health and model resilience skills in every environment that has an impact on child development from birth.
- Enhance resilience and nurture social and emotional skills in young children from birth.
- Provide information to the public and teach them to recognize the signs of traumatic stress.
- Raise awareness that treatment for trauma is critical to achieving the milestones of a child’s social and emotional development from birth.
- Promote trauma-informed services and supports in all child-serving settings.