LIVEThe Thrive Center at Samohi
Teens are facing a mental health crisis due to a complex interplay of factors that takes many forms, including substance abuse, social isolation, depression, and suicidal ideation. The Thrive Center at Santa Monica High School will tackle the crisis head-on through coordinated wellbeing services and positive psychology. This next generation school-based health center will be a place where teens learn how to do more than just survive - they will find the support and tools needed to thrive.
In what areas of Los Angeles will you be directly working?
Westside
Santa Monica High School, SMMUSD, Santa Monica
How do you plan to use these resources to make change?
Conduct research
Implement a pilot or new project
Track impact
How will your proposal improve the following LIVE metrics?
Healthcare access
Rates of homelessness
Walk/bike/transit score
Rates of mental illness
Prevalence of adverse childhood experiences (Dream Metric)
Percentage of LA communities that are resilient (Dream Metric)
Percentage of residents receiving coordinated healthcare services (Dream Metric)
Please explain how you will evaluate your work.
The Thrive Center at Samohi was conceived as part of a suite of strategies to address critical challenges faced by people in our community. These challenges were identified through development of a broad definition of wellbeing first as part of our youth-focused Santa Monica Cradle to Career Initiative and then scaled to the community at large through our award-winning Wellbeing Project. Based on these definitions, we developed mechanisms to measure levels of wellbeing in our community. The Youth Wellbeing Report Card, released in 2012 and updated in 2014, revealed striking baseline findings about the state of mental health and rate of substance abuse among our children, especially among high school students. Success of the Thrive Center will be measured in both micro and macro terms - outputs like rate of use, clinical contact hours, number of faculty trained, as well as moving the dial on adolescent mental health and substance abuse rates as shown in the youth wellbeing report card.
How can the LA2050 community and other stakeholders help your proposal succeed
Money (financial capital)
Volunteers/staff (human capital)
Publicity/awareness (social capital)
Education/training
Technical infrastructure (computers, etc.)
Community outreach
Network/relationship support