Kennedy’s Green Bandana Club is a mental health awareness and suicide prevention campaign marked by bandanas on backpacks who provide support for struggling peers.

The club encourages daily conversations and provides links to mental health hotlines and websites. The Bandana Project works against negative stigmas toward mental health and continues to highlight the problem. The organization has a history of sweeping through campuses to change mental health climates through students who are already passionate about mental health.

Students ages 15-24 are at the highest risk of most mental health illnesses, though 25% will not seek help or treatment, according to the Green Bandana website. 10% students will have considered suicide prior to graduation, and 28%do not know where to go on campus to get mental and emotional health care. 

“For most people, the first person they will talk to about mental health is their friends,” Dana Melone, Green Bandana leader at Kennedy, said. “The more students are trained to recognize concerns and report them to a trusted adult, the more likely someone in need will get the support they need.”