Garrett Lee Smith State Youth Suicide Prevention and Early Intervention Grant

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) has awarded Kentucky Department for Behavioral Health, Developmental & Intellectual Disorders (DBHDID) the 2022 Garrett Lee Smith State Youth Suicide Prevention and Early Intervention Grant (GLS grant). Through this funding, Kentucky will support the implementation of evidence-based prevention and early intervention strategies in youth serving agencies (YSAs) to:

  1. Increase the number of youth-serving organizations who are able to identify and work with youth at risk of suicide;
  2. Increase the capacity of clinical service providers to assess, manage, and treat youth at risk of suicide; 
  3. Improve the continuity of care and follow-up of youth identified to be at risk for suicide, including those who have been discharged from emergency department and inpatient psychiatric units.

Want To Know More?


View SAMHSA.gov

The University of Louisville Center for Instructional and Behavioral Research in Schools (CIBRS) will:

  1. Facilitate development of a community of practice around policy and procedure related to suicide prevention, including the implementation of CODE RED in pilot schools with youth;
  2. Build capacity among educational cooperatives’ implementation specialist to deliver suicide prevention, intervention and postvention activities;
  3. Provide on-site and virtual implementation support to four pilot districts, in collaboration with Kentucky Regional Prevention Centers, in assessing their school policies in regards to suicide prevention and the CODE RED universal safety planning process; 
  4. Create materials to support the delivery of youth suicide prevention activities to students and translate lessons learned to future cohorts of schools and their community YSAs.  

The resulting technical package will support sustainability of the project and continued delivery of youth suicide prevention activities beyond the life of the grant.