Amber Flag

The Amber Flag Initiative aims to encourage schools to promote, and actively bring about a culture change in the promotion of positive mental health within the educational system and other organisations. It enables schools and youth groups to raise awareness of the stigmas which exist in their environments, and the stressors on the mental and emotional wellbeing of those within them.

This year we decided to take on the challenge of earning our first Amber Flag. We established a committee who looked at what the school already does to promote positive mental health and we came up with new ideas to improve our promotion of positive mental health.

This year we held a mental health awareness day, a fundraiser for Pieta House and also had a ‘Wellness Wednesday’ event. For ‘Wellness Wednesday’ we held lots of enjoyable events for the children from juniors up to 6th including an exercise class and meditation session for the junior classes and a quiz and guided meditation for the senior classes. Senior classes also watched a video about mental health which was presented by Dr. Colman Noctor and was designed to educate students in primary school about how they can take care of their own mental health.

We hope this will earn us our first Amber Flag at St. James’ N.S., and we look forward to the challenge of retaining this flag next year!