In the aftermath of a suicide, family, friends and communities respond in different ways. When Connor Ball died by suicide in October of 2011, his family and friends decided that no one else should experience such a profound and life-altering loss. Connor’s Climb Foundation is the result of their love of Connor and their commitment to end youth suicide.
Since then, Connor’s Climb Foundation has grown into a force for positive mental health awareness and youth suicide prevention across the Granite State. With full-time staff, a committed Board of Directors, and numerous volunteers, supporters, and sponsors, the Foundation continues to pursue its lifesaving vision and mission to help protect the next generation.
OUR VISION
The vision of Connor’s Climb Foundation is that no family or community
will lose a youth or young adult to suicide.
According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), suicide is the second leading cause of death for children ages 10-14, and the third leading cause of death for young people under age 25 overall. Like so many social and health-related factors, suicide risk is not distributed evenly: certain racial and ethnic groups, like American Indians and Alaska Natives (AIANs), as well as social groups, including members of the LGBTQ+ community, have heightened risks of dying by suicide. While these facts may seem bleak, there is hope: suicide is preventable. That’s why we have made it our mission to contribute to efforts to prevent this tragedy from happening to our young people and their families.
OUR MISSION
The mission of Connor’s Climb Foundation is to provide suicide prevention education by raising awareness, reducing stigma, and equipping youth, educators, and the community at large with tools and resources focused on the vulnerable age group of 10-24 year-olds, to New Hampshire and bordering communities.
Connor’s Climb Foundation collaborates with teachers and schools, the public, and the mental health system to ensure that the young people of New Hampshire have the lifesaving resources needed to prevent suicide. Through the implementation of suicide education programs in New Hampshire schools, we help educators and students foster help-seeking behaviors so that youth in need of supportive services can either reach out for them directly or get referred to them by a peer, coach, teacher or other trusted adult.
Our goal is to ensure that the youth of New Hampshire do not reach the point of crisis. Instead, they will know the warning signs of suicide, and they will know what to do when they see those signs in themselves or someone else. Check out our Impact Map to see where we’ve been so far!
We follow an unwavering set of guiding principles that inform how we do this work, and we remain committed to partnering with individuals and organizations who share our values.
OUR VALUES
Connor’s Climb Foundation adheres to a series of values that serve to guide our work and ensure we are promoting suicide prevention for all youth.
These values include Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (JEDI),
Respect, Education, and Collaboration.
Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (JEDI): To successfully prevent suicide, Connor’s Climb Foundation is committed to achieving Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion for all by overcoming and repairing the harm imposed on persons and communities by racism, classism, and gender discrimination in our society, institutions, and government policies.
Respect: Connor’s Climb Foundation believes that every person must be treated with respect. We value the perspectives, experiences and insights of our staff, partners, and communities we serve to successfully implement our mission.
Education: Connor’s Climb Foundation aims to create an educated public through the dissemination of public health messaging around mental health and suicide and amplification of its impact. We are committed to providing evidence or research-based, peer-reviewed, best practice information to schools, families, community members, and individual youth/young dults about mental health and suicide prevention-related topics and resources.
Collaboration: Connor’s Climb Foundation values actively building partnerships with nonprofits, private-sector members, public agencies, and private enterprises to further increase visibility of the need for suicide prevention initiatives and mental health awareness.
Thank you for taking the time to get to know us, our vision, our mission, and our values! We are honored to promote mental health awareness and provide suicide prevention education and training to our local communities, and we hope you will support us in our lifesaving work!
