REFLECTION

Looking back at the course of the project, we realized how crucial it is to follow a timeline. We also realized how hard it is to get so much work done in 1 hour. We were very surprised to discover how much hesitancy schools had about us speaking about this topic. With all of the tragedies in schools that have been going on throughout the years and the tie to mental health, we were very surprised to hear that being a concern. We were asked questions like, “well, do you think that talking about symptoms of anxiety and depression might have all these little kids running around saying that they are depressed”? This is exactly why we felt it was even more important to speak about this topic!

If we could go back to do things all over again, we would:

• start by planning our presentations earlier in the semester (We had several schools who wanted to participate but would not because they were starting their state testing).
•  Hosted the event at our school where we could have had stations like meditation, guided imagery, yoga and more where kids could have rotated to practice more coping skills.
• Conducted a  pre and post survey to assess changes in mood and how much information was obtained.
• Added some more audience participation throughout the presentation.