Health and Wellness,Mental Health,Social Mission,Social Determinants of Health,Inclusion & Diversity
Teen HYPE Amplifies the Voices of Black Youth in Detroit Through Innovative Mental Health Programming
Jake Newby
| 6 min read
When Hermione Austin and Kelton Green enrolled in Teen HYPE, they had some of the same insecurities a lot of teenagers have. They lacked social skills, and they weren’t comfortable talking about their mental struggles. But growing up as Black teenagers in Detroit made their upbringings a little different than the average teen.
Teen HYPE, a nonprofit youth development organization, fosters the kind of safe, inclusive and creative environment that allowed Austin and Green to not only find the mental support they needed to come out of their shells, but to become leaders for the next generation.
“I feel like when we talk about Black mental health in teenagers, we also have to talk about the mental health of their parents and how their parents raised them,” said Hermione Austin, who joined Teen HYPE when she was 16 and has since graduated to become a peer educator. “I think the lack of resources in our communities and the lack of education in our communities impacted our mental health, and their mental health.
“And then we’re stigmatized to believe, ‘oh, if you show emotions then you’re weak,” Austin went on. “Or ‘if you want to talk about your feelings then you’re weak.’ Being a Black woman, you have to be seen as strong or else, are you really a Black woman?”
Black communities in Detroit face increasing rates of anxiety and depression and have disproportionately fewer ways to access mental health care. This is why Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan, the BCBSM Foundation and six philanthropic partners set out to reduce these disparities by targeting funding to Black-led community-based organizations through a pilot program launched in 2022.
One of the organizations to receive funding was Teen HYPE, which provides youth development programming and leadership education through a research-based framework that targets Detroit youth between 13 and 18 years old. Much of Teen HYPE’s approach involves around destigmatizing discussions about mental health among Black and Brown youth, by uplifting the power of youth voice to challenge perceptions about what is happening in the community
“Thanks to the support of Blue Cross Blue Shield and its partners, we not only improved our referral system for nearly 100 s youth who are part of our out-of-school-time cohort but we were also able to explore opportunities to provide even more mental health support for the youth we serve in schools, which averages about 3,000 young people per year,” said Dorothy “Dee” Brown, Teen HYPE’s Director of Development . “This support not only helped our young people to develop the skills and the knowledge and the tools to understand mental health in their community, but it also helped them to conceptualize opportunities for their peers to be able to access mental health support.”
How Teen HYPE youth and family support specialist makes a difference for Detroit teens
Mary Zoran is Teen HYPE’s youth and family support specialist. She’s helped build out and develop the referral system while also playing a role in developing individual success plans for each student in the program.
Zoran is passionate about what she does because she’s inside of Teen HYPE’s downtown Detroit space every day and recognizes the need for more culturally congruent care; when providers share the same ethnic and/or socioeconomic background and have walked in the same shoes as their client, that client is more likely to experience a breakthrough and better outcome.
“Specifically, within Detroit, the resources for young people – let alone Black youth – are very minimal and it takes a lot of courage to go forward and get that help,” Zoran said. “Especially when you have providers who may not look like you. There are a lot of wonderful professionals out there but if the youth can’t relate to the person they are talking to, it doesn’t always have the same impact it could be having.”
The resources for care and congruent care are out there in Detroit, but most youth understandably don’t know how where to start to receive help. That’s where the referral system comes in.
“There are lots of resources throughout the city, but sometimes they need someone to guide them throughout the process,” Zoran said. “They have trusted adults here throughout the Teen HYPE space that can recognize signs that they might need support, or help them learn how to advocate for themselves, and collaborate on working to get them the resources they need to take care of themselves.”
Engaging in the Black-Led Mental Health program has brought about transformative changes for the organization and the communities they serve, including:
- Intentionally integrating mental health support across all programs and projects.
- Challenging them to consider impact on every level, including systems.
- Strengthening partnerships with community stakeholders and referral partners.
- Normalizing mental health check-ins for participating teens.
- Recognizing the interconnectedness of adult and youth well-being.
As a result, the organization has successfully secured federal funding to offer Healing Centered Engagement to Detroit Youth Providers, with a goal to enhance the overall youth ecosystem and promote healing within the community and making Detroit the best place in the nation to raise Black and Brown children.
Teen HYPE programming provides an outlet and helps spur important dialogue, self-reflection
One of Teen HYPE’s signature activities is its annual play. Members practice for months before performing for the public, usually in the late spring. While the plays are meant to have entertainment value and promote creativity for the teens acting them, their most important purpose is to help them address their own mental health issues through character work.
“The plays help our members address their own trauma and recognize the feelings and emotions they’re feeling,” Zoran said. “Knowing they are discussing such serious topics – we’ve discussed sexual assault, we’ve discussed social media and the impact it has on their lives – these are real issues people are facing and it provides them an outlet to not only creatively express themselves, but to take action by showing others in the community that these are important subjects to address and talk about.”
Green attended a predominantly white high school at Grosse Pointe North. As a Black teen, he didn’t interact all that much with other people of color growing up and didn’t always feel comfortable in his own skin as a result. His enrollment in Teen HYPE’s inclusive program – and specifically, the bonding and collaboration fostered by the prep work that goes into each play – has helped him develop meaningful relationships with people that look like him. This has drastically improved his sense of self. Now, in a position of leadership as a Teen HYPE retention officer, Green can help others who may have felt some of the insecure feelings he felt three or four years ago.
“The most rewarding part of being involved in Teen HYPE for me is giving back to (the organization) for what they gave to me,” Green said. “They helped me come out of my comfort zone and now I’m helping people who were in the same position as me to come out of their comfort zones.”
Photo credit: Teen HYPE
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