Today@Dal

On April 9th, the Faculty of Agriculture Student Services team will host safeTALK: Suicide Alertness For Everyone. The three hour workshop will begin at 10am in the Riverview Room, Jenkins Hall. The maximum number of participants is 30, so please RSVP as soon as possible. The workshop is open to staff, faculty and students.

Please RSVP by Tuesday April 2nd, 4:00pm. m.sani@dal.ca

safeTALK is a three hour training of LivingWorks Education that prepares anyone over the age of 15 to identify persons with thoughts of suicide and connect them to first aid resources. Most people with thoughts of suicide invite help to stay safe; alert helpers know how to use these opportunities to support that desire for safety.

As a safeTALK-trained suicide alert helper, you will be better able to:

· Move beyond common tendencies to miss, dismiss, or avoid suicide;

· Identify people who have thoughts of suicide;

· Apply the TALK steps (Tell, Ask, Listen and KeepSafe) to connect a person with suicide thoughts to suicide first aid, intervention caregivers.

safeTALK is the result of some twenty years of work at learning how to develop useful suicide prevention abilities in a short program. A carefully crafted set of helping steps and the use of creative educational processes make it possible for you and up to 30 others in your community to leave safeTALK willing and able to be suicide alert helpers. Powerful video clips illustrate both non-alert and alert responses, while discussion and practice help stimulate learning.

One great thing about safeTALK is that the model is complimentary to ASIST, in building tiers of safety in a suicide-safer community. safeTALK participants are taught to connect those individuals having thoughts of suicide to ASIST trained individuals (or other intervention models) and it is a great introduction to the topic for those who plan to attend an ASIST course at a later date. That being said, the skills that safeTALK participants learn stand-alone without additional training.

*safeTALK is a Best Practice Program, recognized as such by the Suicide Prevention Resource Centre.

To learn more about safeTALK, please visit http://www.livingworks.net/page/safeTALK