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The following are suggested activities you can plan on a college campus. We encourage you to include music-related outreach in your activities as much as possible. It’s an excellent way to reach out to students who normally wouldn’t be open to mental health issues.

• Set up an information booth at the campus’s club and activities fair. Play music from some of the mpower supporting artists.

• Create table tents with mental health info and quotes from mpower musicians for the student union and dining halls.

• Provide campus bookstores and libraries with cutouts, fact sheets and borders to create displays about depression, body image, stress or other topics.

• Co-host a free movie and popcorn night with the student activities board. Choose a movie that depicts a person with a mental illness like “A Beautiful Mind,” or “Manic,” and allow time for discussion afterward.

• Get the college radio station involved! Tell them about mpower’s Public Service Announcements or provide the list of songs in the kit to help them put together a show about mental health and musicians.

• If your University has an existing group which sets up concerts and events on campus, collaborate with them to put on a concert benefiting a mental health cause. Invite bands who have an interest or connection to mental health or create a battle of the bands where college musicians can compete for a chance to headline the University's biggest concert. At the concert, ask the bands to talk about mental health issues and the importance of getting help. Also set up an information booth with mpower fact sheets, brochures and stickers to promote awareness.

• Work with the Panhellenic Association and Interfraternity Council to set up speakers to address mental health issues and philanthropy events to raise money for your local mental health association or group.

• Provide resident life (especially resident assistants who live in the dorms) with positive song lyrics about mental health and recovery. These quotations can be used on bulletin boards along with mental health statistics and information.

• Talk to resident advisors about hosting “Beat the Stress” study-break activities on their halls during midterm and final exam weeks. Suggest easy and fun activities, like popping bubbles from a bubble machine, group massages, a punching bag, or a yoga class. Even a campus-wide scream at a designated time can be a healthy release.

• Host a panel of speakers to present on the subject of mental health. Personal stories from students who have a mental illness are always powerful and effective in reaching other students.

• Provide information for the academic support centers, career center, Women’s center, fitness centers, and health center (waiting room, Office of Health Education, pharmacy).

• Work with the university’s counseling services to conduct free screenings for depression, eating disorders, alcohol abuse and anxiety disorders.

• Incorporate information about mental health, and the signs and symptoms of mental health illness into trainings for resident advisors.

• Work with academic programs to incorporate mental health issues into relevant course work such as nursing, biology, health and physical education classes. Don’t forget to talk to the psychology department as well. Even though their courses focus on mental health issues, instructors may not always apply the topic to students’ lives.

For more ideas, go to www.mpoweryouth.org.