ADAP Partnerships

TULSA, OKLAHOMA

The Youth Philanthropy Initiative (YPI), funded by the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation, began with a group of 23 carefully selected high school student applicants from the Tulsa community. The students were charged with choosing a problem affecting Tulsa’s teenagers and making a positive impact in the community with regard to the chosen problem. The teenagers chose to target adolescent depression as their philanthropic initiative. 

After researching statistics, facts, programs and foundations related to depression, YPI chose to team with the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and the University of Oklahoma, College of Medicine, Tulsa, in order to bring the ADAP program to Tulsa as a means of increasing awareness and knowledge about adolescent depression. YPI awarded separate grants to both ADAP and OU to bring the ADAP program to Tulsa. 

In the spring of 2007, ADAP, YPI and OU trained 16 medical students and psychiatric residents who taught the curriculum to over 500 students in five Tulsa high schools. Our groups will continue to work collaboratively to make the ADAP curriculum a lasting component of education in Tulsa schools.

WASHINGTON D.C. 

ADAP is now expanding the education of the 2008/9 school years to several schools in the surrounding Washington D.C. area at the suggestion of Mr. Paul Price and through the generosity of the David Raymond Price Foundation. 

Based on anecdotal feedback from participating parents, staff, and students, the ADAP program has been well received by school communities. Educators at schools, such as the Landon School, have noted how valuable and essential the information is. The program not only offers a better medical understanding and awareness of adolescent depression and bipolar disorder, they say, but it also offers hope and reassurance that treatment options are available.

With the continued success of ADAP, we propose to implement depression education for the students, parents, and faculty/staff with selected Independent Schools of Greater Washington. We will identify school-based educators for training and meet with counselors and other involved participants to review the ADAP program. In order for the ADAP curriculum to reach a national audience, training school-based personnel is the essential first step.