ASIST Training Is So Valuable

by Alan Yarborough, Adjunct Instructor, Management & Marketing

Recently I completed the Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training (ASIST)  offered by The Office of Student Wellness and Well-being.  I can not recommend it enough as a tool in your toolkit to help anyone, especially our students.

ASIST was developed to provide suicide prevention training to everyone.

In this training, you’ll learn how to:

• recognize when someone may be thinking about suicide
• provide a skilled intervention
• develop a safety plan with the person to connect them to further support.

This workshop will increase your confidence and ability to provide a suicide intervention, connecting people to professionals.

• Anyone can experience thoughts of suicide. By learning how to respond and help someone struggling, our friends, family members, students, and colleagues have help to work through the crisis. ASIST makes our community safer.
•  ASIST is the most widely used suicide intervention training workshop in the world. Over 100,000 people attend each year in more than 30 countries.
• ASIST is a dynamic, hands-on workshop that includes presentations, discussions, videos, plus simulations to practice intervention skills.
• ASIST works. Over 50 peer-reviewed studies and government reports show that LivingWorks programs increase participants’ skills to recognize signs that a person is having thoughts of suicide and to confidently intervene to help keep them safe. It is the gold standard of evidence-based suicide prevention training.

I would encourage you to keep an eye out in your email for the next time it is offered and take it if you can, I learned so much and feel better equipped to help our CofC community.