BGH College Ambassador Program: Mental Health Awareness Campaign

How can public libraries help educate the community about mental health awareness and prevention affecting women of color? This is the driving question Black Girl Health Foundation, Inc. seeks to answer through our College Health Ambassador Program. Studies from the National Institute of Health (NIH) demonstrate the success of community ambassadorial projects. Ambassadors are members of the community who engage within the community to encourage health awareness and internal health engagement and outreach program that underpins the goals of Black Girl Health. Specifically, this project within the pre-existing ambassador program will use MedlinePlus, and information about NIH’s All of Us Research Program to educate the community about mental health awareness and prevention. BGH Health Ambassadors will work in at least two (2) public libraries in the Dauphin County Library System in the Greater Harrisburg Area of Pennsylvania to promote mental health awareness and prevention using MedlinePlus. Our overarching goal of this outreach project is to educate African American women, targeting ages 18-49. The project will include the following objectives: 1) Development and execution of mental health campaign that will serve as a promotion tool to engage the target audience about the upcoming workshops. 2) Complete 6 in-person workshops focused on mental health awareness at two (2) public libraries in the Harrisburg, PA area. These workshops will be lead magnets to also share information from NIH’s All of Us Research Program and promote MedlinePlus resources. 3) Collect at least 75 completed MedlinePlus based knowledge assessments from the target audience, which will educate the community on mental health using information from MedlinePlus. This project benefits public health by encouraging African-American women, a high-risk population, to take control of their mental health with increased knowledge from a reliable resource (MedlinePlus).