She came up with the idea of this organization when she was a freshman in high school, specifically the summer of 2023. She started to notice the problem way earlier. It all started during COVID-19. During the pandemic, especially during the lockdown and the quarantine phases, so many people got into mental health issues like depression or anxiety. But she thought about the people who did not have access to these resources or couldn't access them or are hesitant to do so because of the stigma.
That was when she really felt a necessity for an organization that would help these individuals, especially the underprivileged, she started this organization in her sophomore year of high school, and so far they have a website that has more information about what they do, what they'd like to do, and even more information on the issue they are trying to find a solution for.
She then went over some alarming data regarding mental health issues and why it's such an important issue to tackle.
Nearly 20% of children and young is well. People ages 3 through 17 in the United States have a mental, emotional, developmental, or behavioral disorder, and suicidal behaviors among high school students increased more than 40% in the decade before 2019. Mental health challenges were the leading cause of death and disability in this age group. Approximately 33% of adults who are homeless suffer from some form of severe and persistent mental illness.
An additional 7.4 million have recently lost their own homes because of economic necessity, lack of affordable housing, unemployment, poverty, mental illness, substance abuse, as well as the lack of community-based support services and long-term availability of psychiatric hospital beds.
Due to stigma, misinformation, and false beliefs about aging, older people frequently go without adequate care for depression and other psychiatric illnesses and psychological problems.
Too often, doctors offer prescription drugs as a cure-all solution and fail to address the overall mental health and well-being of the older patient.
Individuals in racial, ethnic minority groups also receive less-than-optimal care in the following ways. These individuals are 20-50% less likely to initiate mental health service use and 40-80% more likely to drop out of treatment prematurely.
Over 968,000 veterans lived in poverty in the last year. 20,000 veterans with government-sponsored mortgages lost their homes in 2010.
76% of homeless veterans experienced alcohol. or drug abuse or mental health issues. Only 30% of veterans are enrolled in VA care and there are reports that find disparities even in that care that's given.
Even with so many resources available through the VA and other non-profits, there's still major disparities in brain health equity, especially for people of minority communities or homeless people.
These gaps and issues that they're facing make it inexplicably more harder for them to gain access to crucial and fundamental resources, such as food, housing, shelter, clothing, or emotional support.
These numbers should not stay like this.
We Care is an organization that aims to solve this problem. Some of the people that they strive to help are people belonging to older populations, teens, veterans, LGBTQ plus communities, homeless individuals, low-income families, and people belonging to racial or ethnic minorities. We Care plans to address this problem through obtaining foodstuffs, clothing, hygiene products, stress relief tools, and care packages for distribution to people in need. They also plan on conducting podcasts and webinars and writing blogs to increase awareness and motivation to seek help. In addition, they also strive to provide free counseling to those in need with certified volunteers, psychologists, therapists, and psychiatrists.
As we've seen from the stats, this is a huge problem that we're trying to find a solution for, and we cannot do this alone. First, we need volunteers to help out with our events, writing blogs, or even counseling. Second, they need funds for buying these supplies to distribute and also buying supplies that they will use in their events. Currently, they have a few events that are planned in the month of May, a fundraiser and awareness event at Stop and Shop on the 18th., a fundraiser and a donation drive at Avon High School. It's scheduled to happen in the last week of May.
If you'd like to support this mission in any way possible, whether through spreading the word, volunteering, or contributing, it truly means a lot, and it would be appreciated. They welcome anyone who'd like to make a difference with them. Even $1 has the potential to make a huge change in someone's life. They accept all sorts of donations, including but not limited to money, food cans, gently usage, Clothing, hygiene products, stress relief tools, or books and crossword puzzles, some stuff like that.
Outside of school, she volunteers at FORA, helping refugee children learn English and Math, helps with patient transportation at Hartford Hospital, and tutors students her age for the SATs. She is also a competitive chess player, having won several prizes and coming 2nd in the CT women's chess championship last year, and enjoys playing badminton and tennis. She hopes to pursue research in neuroscience and orthopedics to find a solution to the world's most pressing diseases. She aspires to become a neurosurgeon one day and provide free service to those in need. In addition, she would like to thank Jag Dalal who has been her mentor in establishing and growing her youth organization, WeCare. He is part of SCORE, an organization that helps people create and grow their businesses.
