A Sheffield-based mental health charity ‘Shawmind’ has become an official sponsor of several major sporting teams, in hope to provide mental health education to children across the city.
Adam Shaw, the founder of Shawmind, set up the charity in 2016 after struggling with undiagnosed OCD throughout his childhood, which he realised he could have been supported through with the right education.
The charity has recently teamed up with The Sheffield Sharks and Hatters, as well as the Sheffield Steelers, aiming to spread awareness about the work they do.
Peter Wingrove, 51, the CEO of the charity said: “Adam very graciously, has funded our partnerships with the Steelers and the Sharks.
“In return, these teams have kindly given us access to resources, so we’ve got access to the players, we’ve got access to tickets and that sort of thing, which we can use for either fundraising or just simply to change the lives of people within the city.
“And that’s very much what we’ve been doing.”
Approximately 1.5 million children in the UK are struggling with their mental health, and around 15,000 of these children live in Sheffield.
Mr Wingrove feels there will be many children who these statistics don’t account for, highlighting a desperate need for children to be educated.
He said: “I can guarantee only 25 per cent of these children are part of the system.
“There’s 75 per cent that are unknown and not on the radar yet.
“There’s a lot of advocacy out there and lots of support like Samaritans, who help people when they are far down the line.
“We need to realise that we need to educate children to better understand their emotional situations and how to access help.”
Before bringing the charity to Sheffield earlier this year, Mr Shaw and Mr Wingrove made national impact with their campaign to make mental health education compulsory in schools.
They raised over 103,000 signatures and had the matter debated in parliament.
They have since launched a CPD-accredited suite for mental health training, aimed at workplaces and organisations, and have provided support for over 8,000 children across the country with their programmes.
Mr Wingrove said: “We ran a childrens festival at the beginning of the year.
“We had over 300 kids attend directly through art, music and fitness, and we used those proxies to speak to children about things like eating disorders, body image, bullying and self image.”
To support Shawmind’s campaign, click here.
