Meeting demand around mental health
In many ways, the pandemic laid bare the mental health crisis facing school-age children across the country. Young people lost access to formal and informal support systems that helped them get through their days.
It was during those stressful days in 2020 that Alexis Werner decided to launch what would become Imagine Further Collective with the goal of mitigating the effects of isolation on the mental health of young people in the Pittsburgh region.
Werner saw the opportunity to reach more children through various summer programs and schools throughout the city and launched the collective to provide mental health support and self-care skills to help children develop skills to navigate long, often unstructured days.
“During the summer, our focus is on building positive support systems, identifying healthy coping skills, nurturing the sense of resilience,” Werner says. “We’re looking to give students the tools to process trauma in their lives.”
They provide at least one counselor for every four children. Their staff-to-child ratio maxes out at 4:1, which allows for personal attention and the ability to make real connections. Each of the Imagine Further staff members goes through extensive training to identify children showing signs of trauma and other mental health warning signs.
This afternoon, they’ve taken over a program run by Homewood Children’s Village in a spacious classroom at Pittsburgh Faison school. Werner and her four-person team operate with K–5 clockwork precision to cover a lot of topics and activities in the 50 minutes they’re allotted. It never feels rushed, but every activity serves a purpose.
Today’s session starts like most with each of the 14 children taking a Polaroid selfie of themselves. Then one at a time, every child affixes their photo onto a large sheet with a web-like graphic to map how they feel today. They’ll revisit those feelings later.
As part of the next exercise, young learners sit cross-legged in a circle and take turns pantomiming their preferred coping mechanism that the group then tries to identify.
Dior, who’s going into fourth grade, is first to crawl her way to the center. She tucks her chin to her chest and presses her palms together above her crown of braids.
“Meditation!” several of the children call out. The irony of the loud yelling isn’t lost on the staff, who chuckle to themselves.
Taking turns, other children follow suit. “I hug my pillow,” one boy says shyly. A few nods. One girl says, “I sit in the shower and listen to music.” That was not on the list of suggested skills, but it elicits a resounding positive response from Werner. “I love that! I do that, too.”
The session ends with a centering moment of calm. “Breathe in. Breathe out.”
Werner then surprises the campers by giving each of them a small container of Play-Doh. “Don’t get me in trouble by giving this to you,” she says. “When you get stressed, take this out. Pound it into your fingers. Squeeze it into a ball. Put all of your focus into making it as small as you can.”