Your Donations in Action: Youth Mental Health Summit!

We are proud to highlight one of the areas that our team is using the mission critical funds are community donates! Because of your donations, Northern Light Eastern Maine Medical Center is hosting the second annual Youth Mental Health Summit. This year’s summit is scheduled for Thursday, March 13 from 8 am to 4:30 pm at Husson University’s Gracie Theatre.

Similar to last year, the day will be filled with important workshops about adventure-based therapy, bullying, setting healthy boundaries, creative expression, and so much more. Darryl Bellamy, a national motivational speaker will provide a keynote address that is titled, “Moving from Fear to Fear(less).

The Summit’s Origin

The Youth Mental Health Summit, created by teens for their peers, was established to address the mental health crisis among teenagers in Maine. In 2024, a group of passionate student volunteers at the medical center created the first summit as an initiative to provide their peers with the tools, support, and understanding to better navigate the complexities of mental health challenges.

The Need is Penobscot County

In 2022, the Maine Shared Community Health Needs Assessment identified mental health as the top priority area in Penobscot County. Mental health issues among youth were a specific area of concern for our community, particularly the high rate at which youth experience suicidal thoughts and feeling sad or hopeless. In 2019, 32.5% of high school students and 21.1% of middle school students in Penobscot County reported feeling sad or hopeless for two or more weeks in a row. Additionally, 16.2% of high school students and 18.6% of middle school students seriously considered suicide during this same time period.

If you know a local high school student who would like to attend, click here to register, and if you’d like more information, please email Laura Lacasse, community health coordinator, at llacasse@northernlight.org.