Funding Rural | Episode #2 | Season 4: Mel Butterfield “Promoting Hope”
Mel Butterfield asks, ‘if adults aren’t modeling healthy behaviors, why does it surprise us when youth behavior suffers?’ She is a fourth-generation Central Oregonian and the director of Central Oregon YouthLine, a peer-to-peer crisis, help and support line nationally available. Young people don’t always want to talk to adults when it comes to their mental health, so YouthLine is staffed by young people who have gone through training to support their peers. They say “It’s OK to not be OK” because we all need to talk about mental health more. Youth experiencing a crisis can call 877-968-8491 or text “teen2teen” to 83983.
“Youth are creative about how they get their help and they’re willing to look it up. We need to take away as many barriers as possible to make sure that they have access.” — Mel Butterfield
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About Mel Butterfield
Mel Butterfield, Director of Central Oregon YouthLine, has been with YouthLine, a peer-to-peer crisis, help and support line nationally available at zero cost to the user since 2018. Previously, she investigated child abuse as a Forensic Interviewer, Statewide Regional Trainer, and child abuse/neglect investigator with Oregon Department of Human Services. She holds a BA in Human Development and Family Services, and an MA in Counseling from Oregon State University, Cascades. Mel shares: “Almost all of my professional career has been focused on youth safety and advocacy in one way or another, especially advocating for the importance of youth voice from rural communities as they are less represented. I’m incredibly lucky to be a fourth generation Central Oregonian and will always advocate for youth in our area having opportunities and resources available to them”.
“It’s unrealistic to think that we can bubble wrap our kids from information, from experience..I would much rather have real and open conversations, and know that if I can have that real and open conversation, that they’re going to get at least a nugget of truth before they hear it online or from a friend…” —Mel Butterfield
Discussion Questions
- Mel Butterfield has an invested interest in Youthline not being, what she calls, a flash in the pan resource for rural youth. In what ways can you invest in rural and rural-serving organizations that keep your investments from being a flash in the pan?
- She talks about adults modeling behaviors that are then mirrored by youth—how is your organization supporting this interconnectedness through resources for both adult and youth mental and behavioral help?
Resources
- YouthLine Leadership
- Teen suicide on the rise in Central Oregon | The Bulletin
- Warm Springs Native YouthLine Grand Opening – Spilyay Tymoo
- Oregon crisis call line could help Native youth survive suicidal thoughts – OPB
- The Kids are Not All Right | BendSource.com
- Getting Through Today tool | YouthLine
“We have to start embracing more trust-based and solidarity-based practices, partnering more with local funders and intermediaries… on one hand, we can’t grant our way out of structural problems, but we do have to organize our way towards stronger ecosystems, and that organizing takes investment, but it takes investment in partnership and in collaboration.” —Mel Butterfield
Transcript: Episode #2 | Season 4: Mel Butterfield “Promoting Hope”
Erin Borla 00:10
You’re listening to Funding Rural. I’m Erin Borla with the Roundhouse Foundation, based in Sisters, Oregon. As you may have heard in other episodes, a lot of these were pre-recorded during wildfire season. Today’s guest and I were interrupted when we recorded this interview by an emergency wildfire evacuation alert that pinged both our phones. I also want to let listeners know that we’ll be talking about a difficult subject: suicide and youth suicide in this episode. If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health challenges or suicidal thoughts, you can call or text the National Suicide and Crisis Line 988. And for young people, there’s another line you can call or text 877-968-8491. It’s called YouthLine, and it was started 25 years ago in Portland, Oregon. Now there are seven branches across the state, including one on the reservation of the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs. It’s important to note that you can contact YouthLine from anywhere. You don’t have to be in Oregon. Young people don’t always want to talk to adults when it comes to their mental health, so Youthline is staffed by young people who have gone through training to support their peers. They say it’s okay to not be okay because we all need to talk about mental health more. Roundhouse is a proud funder of the program, and I’ve really enjoyed getting to know the program director of the Central Oregon branch of YouthLine, Mel Butterfield. I started our conversation by asking Mel about some of the challenges that young folks are facing these days that prompt them to connect with the line.
Mel Butterfield 01:43
The top four to five reasons why young people reach out is number one is mental health in general. So whether it’s been diagnosed or not, kind of feelings based. It could be all of those things. So that’s super broad. It could be I’m feeling suicidal and I need some help and support. It could be I am super stressed, and then there’s a bracket underneath that, right? So it that’s so broad, but that’s why that one is the highest highest category is because almost everybody reaches out because they’re struggling in some way. So that one makes sense, and then some of the brackets underneath that generally it’s relationships, both romantic and platonic. I’m fighting with my friends. I’m going through a breakup. Both of those things, everything sucks. All of those, right? Issues with family tends to be really high up there too. My parents aren’t listening to me. They treat my siblings different. I have to do all sorts of chores, and I hate it. Normal kind of things, academic stressors too, and those ones are sort of interesting because they tend to come up in certain times of the year, so right now a lot of our contacts are talking about being really nervous about going back to school. It’s the end of the summer; kids are going back to school. We have a lot of stress that usually happens in the springtime because, unsurprisingly, sometimes kids are struggling and don’t think that they’re going to have all their work done. And maybe I can’t graduate. Maybe I’m being talked about like I’m not only not graduating. Maybe I’m not going to get up to another year, and I have a lot of catch-up work to do. Things like that. So, generally speaking, it’s family, it’s friends, relationships, school, mental health in general, and it’s also been kind of interesting too. I’ve been here long enough where I’ve seen different trends and things happen that are very specific to time. COVID was super interesting. A lot of natural resources that that young people used to have in play prior to COVID. Right, going to school, you have access to counselors and teachers. You had more access to your friends. A lot of that was knocked out, so our call volume went up because they didn’t know what to do. And I, I think that is incredible that youth are creative about how they get their help, and they’re willing to look it up. And we need to take away as many barriers as possible to make sure that they have access to things. So that’s one part. And then there’s some things now with our you know current administration fears around being able to live freely, to have choices, to watch from a youth perspective, massive things happening in your country, and not have any chance to do anything about it because you can’t vote. Lots of times, your voice is suppressed in in different areas, and not knowing what to do with that energy has been super interesting to watch in the last couple years, so I think there’s trends that are unique, but those have been consistent for like the last decade.
Erin Borla 04:28
How many calls are you getting?
Mel Butterfield 04:30
Well, across the board, if you if you look at Lines for Life, I mean we’re upwards of 150,000 calls a year. YouthLine is much smaller, and and I think that’s just because we aren’t the 90-day contract, but we’re also one of the only ones that’s nationally and internationally available. So we’re averaging between 25 and 30,000 contacts a year, and have been trending upwards every year since they really started documenting those. And that was in gosh, I want to say 20. 2010. So when they really started pulling data trends of young people, am I fire? Yeah. Where are we evacuating from?
Erin Borla 05:15
Can’t get it to turn off, so I can’t either.
Mel Butterfield 05:17
Welcome to the podcast of fire.
Speaker 1 05:21
Golly! Oh, it’s in Deschutes
Mel Butterfield 05:23
County. It’s that fire in Deschutes County.
Erin Borla 05:26
I mean, it’s important. I think that we talk about climate grief and climate worry. That talk about. I mean, so the time of this recording, Oregon is currently has burned 2 million acres, several evacuations. This is post Spokane fire as well.
Mel Butterfield 05:40
Yeah, air quality that hasn’t been below 200 in three weeks.
Erin Borla 05:45
Yeah, yeah.
Mel Butterfield 05:46
Wildfire stress is a real thing.
Erin Borla 05:50
Yeesh. Yeah, what a fun time. So, yeah, we all just got evacuation notices of not for us, but for another community here in Central Oregon, we are all fine and managing. But I think talking about how just a notice like that can spike your cortisol and get you anxious and all these things, those are things that, and not just with fire, but with anything, our young people are dealing with on a regular basis and don’t have any control over the situation or how to manage themselves. That’s the importance of the youth line. That’s the importance of giving them the chance to talk to one another. And you know, I mean, I think as adults, like we’re managing our own crises of like, okay, whose is this? Oh, is that our house? Okay, if it’s our house, I got to do this and I got to do that. And the kids are going to be fine, and all they have to do is this. And but the kids are seeing our heightened awareness,
Mel Butterfield 06:41
absolutely,
Erin Borla 06:42
all the things in this political climate, they’re seeing our heightened awareness. What’s happening in, you know, with the algorithm, and if somebody said something mean on Facebook about our neighbor, and we don’t like that, I mean, they feed off of us, and it’s rough.
Mel Butterfield 06:58
Yeah, it’s the same thing. Of and you said it perfectly that we we have young people who are watching the adults in their lives that we hope are regulated enough to support our kids, and this is heightened right now because we’re literally surrounded by fires, but it’s the you know the last few years they they’re watching adults consistently be unregulated and maybe not making the best choices, and then we wonder why our youth aren’t functioning super well, or are also not reacting in ways that we would hope that they would react because we’re modeling a not awesome behavior either. Just trying to do our best too. We have years of experience of seeing things hopefully turn around, we have years of experience of seeing the other side of it. Our young people don’t; they don’t have a narrative that looks any different than this currently right now. And so, for me, it makes a ton of sense. Of no wonder their reactions are huge. No wonder they feel like there’s no hope for tomorrow. Sometimes, no wonder it might feel better. Sometimes, when we’re talking about suicidality, of I don’t know what another the rest of my life looking like this right now. I don’t want to live in that life. That sounds awful. We all have the privilege and the experience of seeing it get better and seeing it change and those kinds of things. And it’s really hard to teach someone that visual, that image-if they’ve never experienced it-so to me, it makes a ton of sense that we have youth that feel that way, and that’s where the work comes in, and why these like just like you said, why these resources are so important. Of, I know that I can’t tell you it’s going to get better, and I know that I can’t convince you of that, but can we get to tomorrow. Can we just get through the next 10 minutes? Can we just sit and and be here for a moment? And usually, and data supports this too. If we can give young people just enough space to get through that horrible, horrible moment, they they can still feel awful. But if they feel awful and willing to keep trying, I’m okay with that. That’s a win, right? Just one step at a time, and not let’s fix this whole thing because that gets too big, and that’s I don’t know how to fix that. But if we can find a tiny bit of space of just like let’s get through the this this moment, this sucks, this is awful, and have some space for that, that can be okay.
Erin Borla 09:19
So with all the different office locations. Are you seeing trends that are that are different from rural places than than urban places or metro places? What does that look like geographically?
Mel Butterfield 09:31
I think the trends are the same because the I think the trends are general enough. I think the self care ideas that come up during brainstorming are super unique and different, and that we have to have some space for what that looks like for rural kids. And I think there is something around the idea we talk about this all the time too, especially I feel like in rural communities, is that trust comes with consistency, and trust comes with oh I’ve I’ve seen you. Around before, I’ve I’ve I recognize you. I recognize the name. I recognize whatever that looks like. I mean, truly, it took me for the first three years I was working out in Warm Springs. I was just the lady that brought candy and bracelets, and now it’s oh, you’re the one with the bracelets and the posters. Also, youth line, right? Yeah. So I think there’s there’s some, and and that’s true for every community that there’s some credit to. We’re investing a lot of time and energy in this idea of I never want to be a flash in the pan as a resource to to rural communities, especially because I’ve seen it happen my entire life and living out here. Of there’s you know a couple years of funding, there’s some excitement around it, and then it gets hard, and and folks leave for a bunch of different reasons. And I’m from here, and I don’t want to see that happen.
Erin Borla 10:48
So the volunteers on the line, first of all, they get they’re not really volunteers like we would call it a volunteer. They’re a volunteer, but they also get a stipend, right?
Mel Butterfield 10:58
Yeah, if they qualify. Yeah, but the qualifications are yes, easy.
Erin Borla 11:02
So that’s important to note that it’s like they’re not necessarily having to give up an after-school job or something to be able to participate because I think that’s important. It opens up the opportunity for all sorts of students to be able to participate. Yeah. Sometimes these calls are heavy. How do you help your their kids, man? How do you help kids helping kids?
Mel Butterfield 11:27
Yeah, we get asked that all the time, and I think it’s such a good question around the idea of like how do we protect young people because these these kids or the content of the of the calls have the potential to be really stressful, and that’s one thing that I can give credit to, kind of the designers of the program, is that there are so many safety, safety kind of barriers built in to the process that really, really help our youth not feel like they have. They are also getting the same message: you never ever have to carry a thing that’s too heavy. So, and that starts from go. So when we you asked about recruiting, when we’re in schools and teaching about mental health and wellness, and we tell them like, if you’re the friend that all your friends come to and tell you all their stuff, you’re already doing the work. Let us just train you, and you know if if you’re the person like that in your family, and your family all comes to you and talks to you, you’re already doing it. Let’s you know, like come in and let us train. So there’s usually a natural progression for youth to get kind of pushed towards this work, whether it’s something that they want to do for their future career, they’re already kind of doing it. You know, they’re just kind of interested in that. So the recruiting happens at events and in schools, and and sometimes kids just ask after they’ve utilized the line. But once they go through that process of just general interest, they get interviewed by us. They fill out applications with us, and a lot of it isn’t a traditional interview. It’s how would you support somebody, and how would you feel supported by the supervisors in the room? How do you react in a stressful situation, and how can we help you if that happens? What can we notice so that we can take things off your plate? Are you a person that asks for help? Are you a person that gets really quiet and sits back? And do we need to watch for those kinds of things? So there’s there’s a ton of prep before they get on the lines. And then I also kind of alluded to the fact that these kids are never alone taking contacts. So we have offices on purpose. They come in and they work with clinicians that are on the lines with them, observing everything. And if anything gets too high acuity, could they take it? Sure, but we have automatic protections in there to say like, you would do awesome on this, and you don’t need to. We take it for them, so we can triage. We can do all of those things, and and they don’t need to to do those pieces of it. So there’s built-in kind of there’s a ton of training and practice. They they know from go that if anything is making them uncomfortable or is feeling too hard, that they can pass to us. They don’t even have to explain why. They’re doing it in an office environment, so they’re never alone. So we can use groupthink. They have clinicians that they can pass to. They’re never at their homes. They’re never using their own platforms and things like that. And we’re constantly teaching them this idea around your boundaries matter, and that it’s okay to be like today is not the day. And I, but this is this is this is too much for me, and I frankly I think the training that we do around that would be good for anyone because I think we sometimes struggle when we’re helpers, right? To to to say that today’s not the day I can’t do that, but maybe can I help you get something else going? Can I help you find another resource? That’s hard for a lot of people, and if we can teach young people how to do that. Heck yeah, and they feel empowered in that they don’t have to feel guilty that they can’t answer that call that day or support that friend that day. So we like literally teach boundaries, and that’s one of the multiple ways that we protect them in this work and. Are better at that than we are, frankly.
Erin Borla 15:04
So we appreciate all those safety mechanisms and all those things, and and we’ve talked about hard topics on the podcast before, particularly around suicide. But the the suicide conversations that we’ve had in the past have been primarily around adults and having conversations about what does this look like, particularly for for older people, what does it look like on the reservation? What does it look like right now? I mean, rates are really high for young people. I think the latest report shows them trending slightly down, but it doesn’t feel like that when you’re living in community.
Mel Butterfield 15:38
No, and we talk about that when we’re in classes. That one of the statistics that I that I ask young people, and I do it in middle school too. So middle and high school, I talk to them about it’s a true and false question, and I say, “Do you think that suicide is the fifth leading cause of death amongst teens your age in the state of Oregon? And they’re all, “I don’t know. That seems really high, but but I think it might actually be higher, and so we move around the room on a true or false kind of scale, and then I tell them it is actually higher. It’s false. The trend for suicide for young people 24 and under has been the second leading cause of death, and I tell them when I’m having that conversation. While that is an awful statistic, that has been that statistic as long as I’ve been in this work for a decade, and we have to change it. And the only way that we can change it is by having open conversations and being real about what that looks like, and making sure that if anything, all of you know that when you leave this class today, that you don’t have to carry that. If you have ever felt that, talk to somebody about it. If you know somebody who’s felt that. Talk to somebody about it, and then that’s the that’s the trend of we have a lot of young people that feel so isolated and and other components too. They feel like they’re going to get in trouble for feeling the way that they feel. They feel like the consequence of telling is going to be worse than the feeling that they’re already feeling. That things will be taken away from them that might be their self care. One example I have is you know a young person was feeling suicidal, was so afraid to tell their parents because the only thing that made them feel better was driving their car and listening to music, and they knew as soon as they shared how bad their mental health was, the first thing that was going to get taken away was their car, and from a parent perspective, it makes sense. But when that’s the only thing that makes you feel better and give you any sense of independence, and just listening to whatever music and podcast you want to listen to, that’s a real fear too. That that’s going to be taken away from. So I think there’s from an adult perspective, youth suicide is the scariest one because we don’t know how to deal with it, and from a youth perspective, they’re afraid of consequences and/or not being taken seriously because there’s still stigma around this idea of oh, the only people that talk about suicide openly are the ones that want attention. That’s not true, right? That oh, if they talk about it, they’re not being serious. Also, not true, and so like there’s a significant amount of education that needs to happen, and then there’s really two sides to the youth one. I think there’s a lot of fear from the adult perspective of we don’t know how to change it, we don’t know how to address it, and there and then there’s the youth perspective of adults don’t understand us anyway, so why should we say anything?
Erin Borla 18:19
Yeah, well, it’s so interesting because I think there’s organizations, and we’ve done this too, where we’re like, “Hey, you know what would be great is to have a youth voice or two or three or five at the table in these conversations. And the pushback we hear is that’s too traumatizing for them.
Mel Butterfield 18:36
I mean, we hear that about the line all the time. That how can you justify this service, and and is it trauma informed? Are we are we creating too much of a of a bigger issue? And then I go back to what I was saying before. This is the most protected work I’ve ever seen for a youth program, and I think that we also very purposely design the way that that young people can have a voice in different places where they always feel that they have a backup. That that’s my responsibility, and I tell our kids all the time that my job ultimately, while you’re helping with other people’s mental health and you’re helping support them, my job is to support you. So if you ever feel like someone’s not listening to you, or you want to have a voice and get into the room, and you’re afraid of what people are going to say. I can be that face. I can get yelled at. That’s fine. So, and having some of those, I think, built in. And there’s also this idea too of I think we mess up a little bit as adults, is that we think that protection of youth voice is by not letting them do it, and that’s not what that is. We think that we’ll keep them safer if we just kind of bubble wrap them and don’t have that, don’t have that experience and don’t do the thing. And I think there’s so much more power and and empowering action from let me stand with you and try it, say the thing. Also, don’t cuss. But right, like say the thing, get it in front of there. I I can stand right with you. They’re gonna learn resilience. They’re gonna learn uncomfortable. They’re gonna learn what they’re good at, what they’re not good at, and it’s so much better to stand with them than to prevent them from learning the lesson.
Erin Borla 20:16
That’s a hard lesson for adults.
Mel Butterfield 20:18
Yeah, we’re not good at
Erin Borla 20:20
No, because we think we know better consistently, and I do that. I mean, I catch myself doing that with my kids. I catch myself doing that. I’m like, e. I don’t. Yeah. And the reality is, like, I have to talk myself out of it, and I have to let like let’s. I mean, I say
Mel Butterfield 20:36
this too, but I also do that.
Erin Borla 20:38
Okay, good. I’m glad you’re not perfect. Finally, but it’s that moment of you know you want to protect them and you want them to not know that there’s bad things in the world and we’re living in a time where there are bad things and they have access to it no matter what they’re if you don’t talk about it they’re seeing it on their phone. They’re seeing it on their Chromebook. They’re seeing it or hearing about it at school. Yeah, I mean, they. It’s not that they’re not exposed.
Mel Butterfield 21:10
Yes, it’s it’s unrealistic to to think that we can bubble wrap our kids from information, from experience, from whatever. I would much rather have real and open conversations, and know that if I can have that real and open conversation, that they’re going to get at least a nugget of truth before they hear it online or from a friend that has a different nugget of knowledge that is probably not super accurate, right? Like if we can if we can push them out with with some knowledge that we know at least on a foundational level, is more right. Are they going to get some stuff that’s not accurate? Yeah, I mean, adults are also in that land of you know figuring out, and it comes down to like let’s teach them how to ask for help and how to be advocates and and how to kind of better their environments through testing it, test it with some guardrails,
Erin Borla 22:02
yeah, yeah. I think we often see funders wanting to be the experts because they want to be able to say we fund projects that we know are mission aligned and driven and evidence based and all these things, and sometimes we’re not the experts, and it’s okay to acknowledge those that we walk alongside on the ground are the ones that are doing that work. Talk about how you are working with different funders across the platform.
Mel Butterfield 22:33
I think there are old school, traditional ways that that funding has happened. Whether it’s it’s whether it’s federal, whether it’s state, whether it’s just that we have like really amazing. You’re one of them. Amazing local folks who are like this is a great program, and we want to continue to help support it. And I think the traditional ways that have been built in for us to fit into boxes for things to to happen is how that is how that kind of narrative gets created. Of we have to say that we’re the expert so that we can get funding, so that we can continue to do these things, whether it’s expand, whether it’s you know just like the visibility and awareness, whether it’s going into schools and getting support to be able to do all of those things. So I think there’s problem in the process, and and so we kind of have to follow along the lines of those things, but I’m with you that I’m not the expert in all of the things. I do have a really unique perspective in that I get the chance to talk to young people every day, and from all over, and then I can kind of put that that knowledge together. And I think that unique perspective is super valuable because it’s also really unique that there are not a lot of programs that have the opportunity that get to talk to young people about all of the stuff that’s really stressing them out. So I think that’s great that we. I don’t know. I still even wouldn’t say that we’re experts in it. We just have the opportunity to talk to the talk to more than others do, and so we get more information, but I think the problem lies in the processes that are in place and have been forever, and how we get grants, how we get funding, what we have to do to qualify for them, does force us to be and say certain things.
Erin Borla 24:17
So looking ahead, what does success look like in a perfect world.
Mel Butterfield 24:23
Super dreamy. Am I allowed to say a different administration? I think super super dreamy, with with zero like zero barriers around money and finances and all of the things. I wish that we had call centers in multiple states across the U.S. For this reason, of young people shouldn’t have to live in cities with massive populations to be able to have really cool volunteer opportunities to learn these kinds of skills and the things that bolster their like professional development and their education and. Be able to like group think with similar minded people. It’s such a cool opportunity, and I’m often bummed that that we’re. I love that we’re Oregon centric, right? That we that we started here and we’re from here, but man, I’d love for other kids to be able to do that piece of it, and to like continue to have the the ability to support these youth all over the U.S. and in different in different countries and not have it be a worry that we lose funding or that we are only in an area for a certain amount of time that has always been super disappointing to me to see really cool stuff come in and then watch it kind of fizzle out after you know two or three years, so I mean that’s my personal commitment to. We’ve seen the massive impact by living and working in an area and doing a ton of outreach. How that increases our call volume through education and and visibility and awareness. Like right now, Deschutes County is our our third. I think we’re number three of the top five counties in Oregon that reach out to Youthline, and I think that is entirely because we’re here and we see kids constantly. We’re passing out all of those things, the the materials, and we’re going to schools and we’re teaching and we’re educating about that. And to me, that means we need more of these. We need more satellites everywhere to go and do these lessons and to educate so that you know that they have resources, many states have their own version, and I think that’s great too. And I think there’s some fear sometimes when other resources hear, well, we don’t want that resources to come in resource to come in because it’ll take away from us. I also think it’s really important that I want to share. Like I don’t want to take away from anything. There’s local resources from within states, communities, counties, and cities that are incredible, and they should stay. And we also know that the way that our mental health works, sometimes a thing works for a while, and then sometimes it doesn’t. And if we can tap something in in the meantime till they go back to that thing working, more is better. And I we never want this idea of we’re taking away from another resource. Absolutely not. I never want to do that. Keep community resources. Those are so critical, and it’s always awesome to have a backup plan. Yeah,
Erin Borla 27:12
yeah.
Mel Butterfield 27:12
I think we can do that.
Erin Borla 27:13
I always enjoy just chatting and catching up, and I think you’re such an inspiration in the work that you’re doing, really bringing the youth voice forward, even if they feel like they can’t participate or are not able to be in those places, your representation of of what they’re hearing, what they’re feeling, what they’re seeing is always so clear. And I know my kids have both had presentations by by you and your staff. My daughter wears her her bracelet all the time, so we just certainly appreciate all the things you’re doing, and I’m glad you were here to share.
Mel Butterfield 27:48
Yeah, I’m. You are the other pillar of that, my friend. Like, it’s organizations like yours, and being able to to support the work. Truly, we wouldn’t be able to do the work regardless if we didn’t have people with the equally level of passion and hope behind it that also support the idea of like youth should have voice. So I appreciate you so much and the work that you’re doing, and thanks for having me today.
Erin Borla 28:22
That youth voice is so important. It’s so important to all the work that we’re doing as philanthropic funders, as community advocates, as folks that are in community and and really trying to make change happen. And how do we get access to young people? It’s through programs like this, through programs like Youthline, through FFA or 4-H, when we’re talking about rural places or school programs, how do we uplift those voices that we’re hearing? And I think the best way to do that is by partnering with orgs like these. Recently, we’ve seen impacts of federal cuts to a variety of programs, including things like 988 and even the Youth Line. These programs are critical to the success of our communities. Having places where people can call and reach out, or text and talk to peers about challenges that they’re going through. With these cuts, this is something that philanthropy can step in and patch at least until we can have a better and bigger conversation. Check out fundingrural.com for links to the Youth Line, all their information, and I should reference that they have awesome swag. You can get all sorts of things like bracelets and posters and stickers on their website for free. Just pay the shipping, and these are things that we take to site visits across the state, and all of our partners love to have access to these, so check it out. Thanks for listening to Funding Rural.
