Orlando, FL – IDEAS announced that it is working with the nonprofit organization Give an Hour™ to create marketing tools for the National Awakening Campaign. The campaign is asking mental health professionals nationwide to donate an hour of their time each week to provide free mental health services to military personnel and their families.
“Working with Give an Hour™ has been a passion of ours for the last two years,” stated Shirley Decker, EVP Business Development of IDEAS. “This campaign is extremely important to the military personnel and their families that have been affected by the current conflicts. When military personnel are overseas we give them full support and we have seen in the work we have already done how vitally important it is that Americans give that same level of support here at home and Give an Hour™ provides the ability to do just that.”
The Give an Hour™ team was looking to create media to spread awareness of what military families are going through and what the public can do to help. After much research, they found veterans willing to tell their stories on camera through personal interviews. IDEAS is putting together a six-minute piece that will be shown to a variety of audiences to build awareness and help the public know where to go to learn more and assist where possible.
“We are pleased to be working with the talented and creative minds at IDEAS on this important cause,” commented Barbara Van Dahlen, Ph.D., founder and president of Give an Hour™. “Our hope is that this campaign will aid in the recruitment of more mental health professionals to our network and, more importantly, will help connect military men and women and their families to our vital services. Making the general public aware of what our servicemen and women are facing also will go a long way in reducing the stigma associated with mental health issues.”
About Give an Hour™ (www.giveanhour.org): Give an Hour™ is a nonprofit organization providing free mental health services to U.S. military personnel and families affected by the current conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Currently there are more than 4,400 licensed mental health professionals on its network, in all 50 states, Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico, and Guam. Give an Hour™ aims to recruit 40,000, or 10 percent, of the nation’s 400,000 mental health professionals to this cause.
