Hi. My name is Isabel Medlock and I am a freshman at SLA. Earlier this school year my English class started a project called You and the World. Everyone in my class chose an issue and researched that issue. I chose the stigma of mental illness, the negative way society views mental illness. After we chose an issue and researched it, we wrote two blog posts about it. Here is the link to blog #1. In this blog post I wrote about what the stigma of mental illness is and how people are affected by it. In blog #2 I wrote about the Mental Health Parity, discrimination those with mental health issues face, an interview I conducted with a mental health professional, and my opinion on the stigma of mental illness. This is my last blog post and it is the post for change which is the last part of the project.

There are several ways people are trying to raise awareness of the stigma of mental illness. There are some organizations and campaigns. Some examples of these types of campaigns are Stamp Out Stigma, Stand Up For Mental Health, and I Am Not Crazy.  Stamp Out Stigma is an organization that tries to reduce the stigma of mental illness and substance abuse by educating people and encouraging to them to discuss this issue. Stand Up For Mental Health teaches mental health consumers how to turn their problems into stand up comedy acts and perform them. I Am Not Crazy helps raise awareness of the stigma of mental illness by using social media and the internet. Also, every year on the first full week of October is Mental Health Awareness Week. During this week there are events that educate others about mental health and promote the education of mental illness. These events are designed to help end the stigma. These are all very good ways of changing society’s view on mental illness but I think more should be done. Even with all these organizations and events not that many people know the truth about mental illness or know about the stigma. I think children should be educated on this subject in school. If children were educated about mental illness they wouldn’t believe in the stereotypes surrounding mental illness and that would greatly reduce stigma.

Students on a website during my presentation.

For my agent of change piece I made a presentation to my advisory about the stigma of mental illness. In my presentation I explained what the stigma of mental illness is and why it is a problem. First I told them to go on a website and learn some things about mental illness and take some quizzes. Then I had each group read some stereotypes and discuss whether or not the stereotypes were true. At the end I showed a video from Bring Change 2 Mind. By doing this I helped raise awareness of the issue. Hopefully the people who viewed my presentation will want to learn more about mental illness and the stigma and maybe try to help reduce the stigma.  I enjoyed doing this project and learning about the stigma of mental illness. I think it’s a very important issue that needs to be talked about more, especially in schools. One thing I learned about myself and others is that when we are ignorant about something it often leads us to believe in stereotypes. The reason there is so much stigma surrounding mental illness is because people don’t learn about it.

My presentation.

All the pictures above are from my presentation. In the first two pictures students are on a website, learning about mental illness. In the third picture students are discussing common stereotypes about mental illness. In the fourth picture I am explaining what the stigma of mental illness is.

I think I could have done a better job with my agent of change piece. I don’t think I’ve done enough. There are still so many people who don’t really understand mental illness and the stigma surrounding. I wish I had done something that would inform more people about this problem. There is still so much left to do to change people’s view on mental illness. People need to be educated about mental health. We need to change the laws that discriminate against those with mental health problems. We need to make people with mental health problems feel accepted instead of ashamed.

I would like to thank Ms. Dunn for all her help and advice. I would also like to thank all the people who helped proofread my blog posts.  I have enjoyed doing this project and I have really enjoyed learning about the stigma of mental illness. I hope that in the future it will no longer be a problem.

Thanks for reading my post! :-)

Links to my presentation:

Advisory Presentation Slide Deck

Hi. My name is Isabel Medlock. Earlier this school year our class started a project called You and the World. Each of us chose an issue, researched it and then wrote a blog post about it.  Here is the link to my first post.  The issue I chose is the stigma of mental illness, the negative way people perceive mental illness and those affected by it. In my first blog post I talked about people’s opinions on mental illness, the discrimination that those with affected by it face, and the fact that the mentally ill don’t seek the help they need because of the stigma.  Since then, I have researched my topic online further and also conducted an interview with a mental health professional.

Recently, I have learned about the Mental Health Parity, which requires health insurance providers to give the same benefits, financial requirements, and limitations as those that apply to physical health benefits. I also researched discrimination against people with a mental illness in other parts of the world. For example, in Lithuania people with mental health problems are not allowed to own a home. In some parts of Korea people with mental health problems are not allowed to enter a swimming pool. I also learned that about 75% of Americans and Europeans with a mental illness don’t receive treatment. 

This is an image that provides information about how different places in the world have rules that stigmatize people with mental illnesses.

For my original research I interviewed Dr. William Fox, a psychiatrist. One important thing I took away from the interview was how people are affected by the stigma. It limits their ability to get help because of “lack of awareness —often willful, lack of effective treatments/options, and lack of access.” Sometimes they are unaware of their condition and in other cases they don’t want to believe that they have a problem. Also people lose health insurance coverage, employment and relationships. I also learned about the Kübler-Ross 5 stages of grief and how it also relates to how people cope with mental illness. The five stages are denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. When people find out that they have a mental illness they don’t want to believe so they are in denial. Next, they are angry about having a mental illness. Then they try bargaining with the doctor to get them to fix their problem. Next is depression which “is both a stage and diagnosis, but often people have " secondary depression" about having another psychiatric issue.” Last is acceptance, which is not the resolution of their illness but coming to terms with their situation. Stigma is causing people with mental illness to act so ashamed about having a mental issue. I think that it’s terrible that people get secondary depression just because they have a psychiatric issue. This interview helped me understand what people with mental illnesses go through, how the stigma affects them and what people can do to help.

After analyzing the information I've read online and conducting the interview I have gained some new insights on the many issues that people with mental illnesses face. Reading about the Mental Health Parity made me realize that some things are getting better for people with mental illnesses.  Although some things are getting better there is still a long way to go until the people with mental illness aren't stigmatized and don’t have to face prejudice and discrimination. I reviewed some more statistics that reaffirmed what I already knew about the stigma of mental illness and how it prevents people from getting help. For example, only 25% of Americans and Europeans get treatment for their mental illnesses. All the new information made me realize that this issue is worse than I imagined it to be when I began working on this project.

This image provides information about people with mental illnesses and whether or not they are violent.

Now that I’ve learned more about the stigma of mental illness I’ve realized that it is a much bigger issue than I originally thought. It is unfortunate that people aren’t able to receive the help they need because of society's negative view on mental illness. And because they can get help some people are driven to commit suicide. If there wasn’t so much stigma associated with mental illness there would be less people committing suicide and so many people would have better lives. It is also unfortunate that the mentally ill are so misunderstood, which the image above shows. People see the mentally ill as violent criminals when in fact they are usually the victims of crimes. This is another way stigma affects the mentally ill. I also feel ashamed of our society and of myself. Before I started this project I didn't know anything about mental health stigma and I believed the stereotypes about people with mental illness. I never considered how those with mental illness felt or were affected by those who didn't understand or even know what they were going through.  It’s extremely important that people start raising more awareness of this issue so there is no more stigma.

The image on the left is a poster that is meant to help fight stigma. The image on the right is from a magazine that wrote an article about how violent people with mental illnesses are.

Even after learning more about the stigma of mental illness I still have several more questions. When and why did people start feeling so negatively towards mental illness and those affected by it? How were those with mental illness treated in the past? What were the conditions in mental asylums in the past? What are the conditions in mental asylums now? As I keep on researching my topic I hope to find the answers to these questions and also to find ways I can help.

As part of our project we have to do something to help solve the issue and be an “Agent of Change”. Since I can’t really volunteer somewhere and do something meaningful, I’m going to spread awareness of the issue. One way I hope to do that is by discussing this issue with my advisory so they can learn about it and hopefully teach others about it.

Thanks for reading! Be sure to read my next blog post!

Annotated Bibliography

Here is the link to the entire interview.

Articles about this issue: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/natasha-tracy/mental-illness_b_4761908.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sarah-fader/stigma-mental-illness_b_4680835.html

    Hey, My name is Jamilah Woodards. I am currently a Freshman at Science Leadership Academy. In my ninth grade English class, we are currently working on a project titled, “You And The World” (YATW). The YATW Project allows you to choose a topic that you are highly interested  in to research and discuss. For this specific project, I chose the topic of Alzheimer’s and Dementia; The Unknown & Hidden Facts. This topic hits really close to home because my Grandmother was diagnosed with Dementia around the year of 2006. With that being said, I decided to base this project off of a disease that really affected my family and I.

  Alzheimer’s disease is very well known all over the world, but Dementia is somewhat forgotten. Although many people have heard of this disease, not many people know what exactly is Alzheimers and/or Dementia. The medical definition for Alzheimers as described on  www.medicalnewstoday.com, “Alzheimer's disease is a neurological disorder in which the death of brain cells causes memory loss and cognitive decline. A neurodegenerative type of dementia, the disease starts mild and gets progressively worse.” As briefly shown in the definition for Alzheimer’s, there is a difference between the two. Dementia’s medical definition found on a medical definition website stated as following, “Dementia is a loss of mental ability severe enough to interfere with normal activities of daily living, lasting more than six months, not present since birth, and not associated with a loss or alteration of consciousness.”

  Dealing with either of the two diseases can be very expensive. Yes, most insurances pay for portions of the costs and treatments, but the other portion is most likely put on the patient/their provider. A portion may not seem like it would be very costly because it is only a “portion”. Yet when Medicaid/Medicare is in the billions of dollars, that out-of-pocket portion can also be in the billions.

This picture shows the costs of supporting someone with Alzheimer's or Dementia disease

As seen in the chart above, about $142 billion would be the cost between Medicare and Medicaid. Although the cost that Medicaid provides on its own is just 1 billion dollars above the cost of personal money.

One stereotype about dealing with people who have these diseases is that they are completely unable to complete any tasks on their own. False. People believe that patients with Dementia cannot remember anything. That is also false. Since Dementia is basically a milder form of Alzheimer’s, it allows consumers to do some things that they can't. Although people with Alzheimer’s have more of a struggle than Dementia, it is still possible to do things on your own. They’re plenty of people out there who live a healthy life on a daily basis. Know that there is a mild and severe form of just about everything, so it all depends on the stage of your disease to know what exactly exceeds your abilities.   Check out the list of 5 Things You Should Know About Dementia to a further understanding.

Overall, Alzheimer’s and Dementia are diseases that should be even more now than they already are. They affect people and their families on a regular basis. I would like people to get to know and understand the stereotypes, costs, and know what the diseases actually are and do.

Blog #2 is on its way!!!

Annotated Bibliography

Hello. My name is Gabrielle Cromley and I am a student at Science Leadership Academy. For my English class, we were asked to do a project called You and the World in which we were to write three blog posts about a subject that was important to us. We have to make a change in the world or the community to help benefit our cause.

I chose to write about finding a cure for cancer and how medical malpractice and lack of government funding is preventing researchers from reaching their full potential. This issue is meaningful to me because I lost my cousin to lymphoma cancer. He received a sepsis infection from the hospital and was never able to recover. Watching him suffer and holding his hand as he took his last dying breath made me realize that no one should ever have to go what he went through or die from the negligence of others. He was also my godfather and he has a special place in my heart so I want to do all I can to make sure that he receives vengeance against this illness. This is also an important issue to me because I want to become an oncologist one day and medical malpractice and cancer research would directly relate to this career.

Cancer is a disease that is caused by abnormal cell growth and reproduction rapidly. The cell’s DNA is damaged which causes the cell to not perform actions normally. There are many types of cancer that can attack parts of the body and spread throughout it. Cancer causes physical, mental, emotional, and financial suffering for patients and their loved ones. As stated by the World Health Organization, “It is the main cause of death worldwide. Deaths from cancer worldwide are expected to continually rise to an estimated 13.1 million deaths by 2030.” In the United States alone, cancer still causes a substantial amount of death, most of which should have never happened.

Amounts of new cancer cases and death

You may think a hospital is always the safest place for the sick, but this is not always true. Many hospital patients’ lives are prematurely ended due to infection which is caused by negligence, medical malpractice, and just plain carelessness. “More than 45,000 cancer patients die from hospital caused infections which also wastes $8.1 billion,” states Miriam Falco in “Hospital-acquired Infections Lead to Substantial Loss in Life and Wastes Billions” Since cancer patients have immune systems that are susceptible to disease and infection, more precautions and care needs to be taken in order for the patient to be safe. As described below by The National Center for Biotechnology information, patients who are unknowingly not responding to treatment are likely to receive an infection depending on their type of cancer.

The frequency of infection is related to the type of underlying neoplastic disease, and most   infections occur in patients who are no longer responding to the therapy of their neoplasm. About 80% of patients with acute leukemia, 75% of patients with lymphoma, and 50% of patients with multiple myeloma develop infection during the course of their disease, and infection is the proximate cause of death in a substantial fraction of these patients.

If doctors are unknowledgable to the fact that a patient is unresponsive, it could cost the patient his or her life. To learn more in depth data about infections in cancer patients click here.

A patient can also die or get worse due to chemotherapy or radiation treatment. Chemotherapy and radiation are harsh treatments that greatly affect the body, and for some people the effects can be deadly. Click here to read more about these therapies and their effects in “Death by Doctoring”.  We should not limit ourselves to to only two main types of treatment. Through research, we can possibly find a more efficient treatment and maybe a cure.

The last obstacle that has to be faced before a cure can be found is government funding towards cancer research and for that matter all types of scientific research. According to  The United States government only gives 2% of their budget to all scientific research. Chief medical officer, Richard L. Schilsky said, “This trend could potentially devastate future cancer research, just when we are on the verge of achieving major progress against cancer and identifying the next generation of effective cancer therapies.” Science is the door to the future that holds advancements and new opportunities that can help our world and we are going to disregard findings that could save lives. Also, cancer research is very expensive along with other forms of scientific research. Research cannot be conducted if there is no money to pay for what is needed. You cannot put a price on a life, which is why we as a country should do everything we can to help cancer patients out of their pain and suffering.

Graph of the United states budget

Bibliography

Hello!

My name is Hanna Dunakin and I go to Science Leadership Academy in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. I am in Ms. Dunn’s English 1 class. Ms. Dunn recently introduced a new project called “You and the World” (YATW). We are supposed to pick an issue in the world that interests us and we believe is important. During the project we also have to find a way to help the issue we chose, and make people aware of it. You can volunteer, donate, create an organization, make a blog, or anything you think could help.

World hunger and Poverty have always been a interest of mine. My mother has always tried to help the people in need by buying them clothes, food, and during Christmas, toys for kids in need.  Although both hunger and poverty are important issues, hunger is part of poverty. I want my project to be about a specific issue, instead of a general issue.

Nearly 870 million people suffer from undernourishment in the world, that’s one in eight! 852 million of those people live in developing countries, which is 15 percent of the population in those countries. 100 million children under the age of five suffers from hunger and underweight. Each year it has been estimated that nearly 10.9 million children die, at least five million of those 10.9 million die because of malnutrition. This is our future generation dieing. Who knows, our next president could of been part of that group. What if person/s who could of found a cure for cancer, or a solution to immensely decrease the rate of world hunger, died in that group? We could do so much more than what we are doing now. Sometimes I even wonder, do people really know how serious and dangerous this issue is?

Hunger is usually described as starving or lack of food for a couple hours and you need a snack. Hunger is not that simple. The definition of chronic hunger, from http://www.worldhunger.org/, is:

Hunger is a term which has three meanings (Oxford English Dictionary 1971)

• the uneasy or painful sensation caused by want of food; craving appetite. Also the exhausted condition caused by want of food

• the want or scarcity of food in a country

• a strong desire or craving

This is a very important issue because it’s not getting the attention it deserves. There are walks, runs, and fundraisers for issues like, childhood cancer (or cancer in general), AIDS, diabetes, etc. but there aren’t any for World Hunger. Although there are organizations that conduct fundraisers to collect canned food and toys for the people in need, it’s not enough. In reality hunger kills more people than AIDS, Malaria, and tuberculosis combined! I’m not saying I don’t care about the people who suffer from these illnesses, because I do. What I’m trying to say is, if hunger is a bigger world issue than three world issues combined, maybe hunger should get at least the same amount of scrutiny.  

The UN (United Nations) has started something called the Millennium Development Goals. It is a series of goals concerning world hunger. For example, obliterate extreme poverty and hunger in the world, decrease child mortality, and many other goals that the UN hopes to accomplish by 2015. Is that enough time to accomplish all the goals they have set, including the goal for poverty and hunger? The goals can be found in the United Nations website. Below there’s an infographic of the UN world hunger and poverty goal:

The UN is bringing awareness to this issue. They set a

goal that they hope to accomplish by 2015.

There is another organization called Heifer International where you can donate money to give a family in need a heifer, goat, or water buffalo. The reason a family gets an animal and not money is because these animals give the families something called the 12 Cornerstones. This is better than money because it gives families immediate help. They wouldn’t have to spend lots of money on their own animals because the animals given to them are donated. If they got money they would buy food and clothes because it would be the only affordable thing for them. With animals they can get nutrition and clothes for no cost. Heifer International works in 36 countries and have helped 20.7 million families so far. Imagine the number of people they have helped.

There need to be more organizations like Heifer International and the UN Millenium Goals if we truly want to bring awareness to this issue. Runs and walks should be organized to raise money for organizations like Heifer. Families need something they can hold on to, something to raise their standard of living during the long term. Money can’t do that which is why the Heifer organization is a great example of what we should be doing. Setting goals always helps people to push harder so that they can accomplish it. That’s why the UN made a goal to fight against hunger and poverty. A man named Rob Rhinehart came up with a simple idea for a solution that could decrease the amount of hunger in the world. Small steps like these turn into huge steps by the end. These are things that the entire world should be doing. 870 million people need our help. Future generations need our help. World hunger needs to be eradicated!

Stay tuned for my next post!

UN Goal

Facts

About Heifer International

Bibliography

Hi! My name is Isabel Medlock and I am a freshmen at Science Leadership Academy. This year in English class we had to choose an issue, research it and then try to do something to raise awareness of the issue or help solve it. The issue I chose is the stigma of mental illness. The reason I chose this topic is because mental illness has interested me before and after reading a little bit more about it I decided it was a good issue to choose. Another reason I chose this issue is that some members of my family are affected by a mental illness.

People perceive mental illness with a negative perspective and that leads to prejudice, discrimination, and stigma. The Mental Health Commission defines stigma as a mark of disgrace that sets a person apart. Many people think that mental illness only affects a few people when in fact in a given year one quarter of adults are diagnosable for at least one mental disorder. Another common belief about mental illness is that all people with a mental illness are violent and should be kept in a hospital.  In a 2006 Australian study it was found that 1 in 4 people thought that depression was a sign of weakness and would not employ someone with depression. 1 in 3 people said they would not vote for someone with depression and 1 in 4 people thought that people with schizophrenia are dangerous.

This is a chart that shows the percentage of adults with a serious mental illness by state:

People who have a mental disorder are discriminated.  In England, if you have a mental health condition you are not allowed to serve on a jury. You can also be removed as a director of a company if you have a mental disorder. In a video I saw one woman said that she wanted to join a local weight loss group. When she told the counselor who ran it that she had a mental illness she was told that she shouldn’t join because she would be disruptive and the other members of the group wouldn’t want someone with mental illness in their group. There are just a few examples of ways that people with mental illnesses are treated unjustly.

In 2008 only 13.4% of adults received treatment for mental health problems. That’s a little over half of the adults diagnosable with a mental disorder. The reason people aren’t seeking treatment for their mental disorders is the stigma surrounding mental illness. The stigma makes people too ashamed or embarrassed to get the help they need. 90% of the people who commit suicide have depression or another mental disorder. Most of these deaths could have probably been prevented if these people weren’t afraid to get the treatment they needed. It’s important that we change the view on mental illness so that people are no longer afraid of getting help and don’t choose to end their lives. People with mental disorders have to live with the stigma and the discrimination every day and it isn’t fair.

These two newspaper headings are examples of how the media portrays those with mental illness.

After researching this topic I have new questions. How did people view mental illness in the past and how has their view changed since then? Are there illnesses that are viewed more negatively than others? Why did people start viewing in a negative way?  How are children and teenagers affected by the stigma of mental illness? As I keep researching this topic I hope to find the answers to all these questions. I also hope to find more stories about the experiences people have had living with mental illness.

Here is a link to a video of a man with schizophrenia and his mother discussing the stigma.

Mental Health Discrimination Bill video

Hello!  My name is Indee Phillpotts and I am a freshmen at Science Leadership Academy.  For a project in my English class we had to choose a topic that interest us and that we care about.  I chose women bias in the Science and Engineering workfield.  I am a young women, and although unsure of what I want to be when I grow up I deserve to have as many options as possible.  

For years and years women have been considered worthless and less important than men.  It was an unwritten rule that the men had the jobs and the women took care of the cooking and cleaning.  That is not the case now.  In these days women have more rights than they’ve had in the past centuries; but there’s still a long way to go.  For instance, men are paid more than women.  On average a women working full time makes $.70 for every dollar a man makes.  But pertaining more to my topic only 11% of engineers in the world are women.  Leaving the other 89% to be men.   

It’s unfortunate that such a small amount of women are in that workfield when women are as capable as men at these jobs.  Like Ada Lovelace for instance.  The majority of people have no idea who she is and what she has done.  That is insane because Ada Lovelace was the worlds first computer programmer.  Without her we wouldn’t be where we are with computers.  If a man was the first computer programmer he would probably be considered the “father of computers.” Which coincidentally when googled is Charles Babbage, Ada's lifelong friend. Charles Babbage actually enlisted Ada to translate a french memoir by mathematician Louis Menebrea, to which Ada added incredibly important notes that would be used by Charles. I'm curious to know if Ada was living in more recent times if her talents and accomplishments would have more recognition then they did back then.

Ada Lovelace (1815-1852) First Computer Programmer.

During World War II when all of the men went to fight in the war, women got to show that they are capable of working too.  Since women were never really introduced to the jobs that they could temporarily have, the government  created a fictional character named “Rosie the Riveter” to inspire women to get jobs.  Women were inspired all right!  Before the war only 1% of people in the aircraft industry were women.  That number jumped to 65% during the war.  Women who had never worked with large machines or engines were doing equally as good a job as the men.  Sadly when the war ended women were replaced with men in their jobs and everything went back to the way it was.   This probably contributed to why the women rights movement came into action.  Once women got a taste of those jobs they wanted more.

Rosie the Riveter, A fictional character created during WWII to motivate women to

get into the workfield.

There’s proof that women are as able as men to do “man's” work.  But then why in present day do less women study for these professions and aspire to be engineers?  It is said that by the age of 4 children are conditioned to think that boys have trucks and build things and girls have dolls and play dress up.  Before children are even taught to multiply and divide they already have it put in their minds that girls can’t do certain jobs.  Because of that conditioning it’s a given that boys will dominate in those fields. This puts girls who want to work in those areas in hard positions.  It’s hard to feel comfortable in an environment when you’re the only one of your gender.  Girls in single sex schools even have a higher participation in physics than in co-ed schools.  Probably due to the lack of competition.  The bias in these work fields is impossible to ignore; especially from a woman's standpoint.  If women and girls are informed about this topic, then maybe we can move toward a more accepting and less biased future.

Bibliography