Sisu is a mental health skill building platform focused on teaching social and emotional learning concepts around specific topics such as stress and anxiety and grief and loss in a 12-week time frame.

Our curriculum has been vetted and shaped by top clinicians in the field from a social and

emotional learning perspective. Sisu is not therapy though, and is not meant to substitute

medical advice of any kind.

During the pandemic, many young people suffered from mental health issues more than any other age group. We have seen a gap in many young people who have gone through a transition from going from remote back to in-person and want to provide additional support to those needing it.

As GenZ is the first generation to be fully digitally native, there is also an opportunity for parents to understand how these topics have evolved in how young people view themselves as well as how they communicate about these topics.

Sisu is a concept supported by Healthworx, an innovation studio started by CareFirst out of the BlueCross Network.

Our curriculum was developed with a few goals in mind to build key communication skills and relationships within their community as well as home. Our stress & anxiety curriculum is focused around building the following skills in young people:

Relationship Skills

Self-Awareness

Self-Management

Social Awareness

Responsible Decision-Making

Self-Advocacy

Mental health skill building is meant to equip resiliency-based tools to growth-minded individuals. Unlike therapy or counseling, it’s meant to be heavily participation and reflection based, giving time to understand ourselves, our community, and the world around us more with an emotional intelligence that often isn’t taught in schools.

Sisu programs are meant to provide support during challenging, complicated times on a variety of topics ranging from divorce to grief, depression and anxiety. Simply stated, they are topics we wished the world did a better job of preparing people for when they reach adulthood. From losing a job to being unable to make friends, there are many facets of life we don’t speak about or moments where we wished previous generations spoke more candidly about to prepare us for the reality vs our expectation.

A 12-week program constitutes 3 modules of 4 weeks each. Each week involves a mix of content — a mix of short videos, questions for reflection, and interactive elements. Both teens and their parents will also receive a ‘weekly gem’ each week — a question that encourages them to open up about a certain topic. Only once you both submit your answers can you see one another’s responses.

All of Sisu’s content has been thoroughly reviewed and approved by qualified therapists, and much of it has actually been created in conjunction with them, too. Please note that Sisu is not therapy, it’s mental health skill building and education.

Sisu’s programs are 12-weeks long, divided into three modules, each 4 weeks long. Every week’s content is self-paced, meaning for some learners it may take longer than others. We estimate it to take no more than 10- 25 minutes to complete each week’s content depending on your pace as well as time for self-reflection.

Each teen is matched with a Near Peer Mentor. This is usually a college-aged individual with a background in crisis prevention. We also provide them with additional Sisu training. The Near Peer Mentor is close enough in age to your teenager to really “get” them and help them feel understood, and also has enough experience to help guide them in a positive direction. Near Peer Mentors send your teen a check-in message once a day, and are available for support 9—5PM throughout the week.

A Family Support Specialist is a licensed therapy provider — typically an LCSW. They have always completed graduate level work either social work, psychology or counseling.

These individuals are not available around the clock but during typical business hours from 9AM-7PM EST Monday through Friday. Each peer mentor will be reaching out to students for check-ins and to be a source of support depending on that student’s level of engagement or need. In the case a student chats when a peer mentor is unavailable, they will respond at the earliest availability during business hours.