Abagail Lucius, a freshman at Pendleton County High School (second from right), talks with a group of students during a breakout session at the Sources of Strength Peer Leader Summit. Photo by Fiona Morgan, Kentucky Department of Education, Oct. 24, 2025
Content warning: This article discusses suicide. If you or anyone you know is struggling, please contact the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.
(LEXINGTON, KY) – Students from around the state shared ideas on supporting mental health in schools during the second-ever Sources of Strength Peer Leader Summit on Oct. 24.
Held at the Bluegrass Community and Technical College’s Leestown campus in Lexington, the summit was co-hosted by the Kentucky Department of Education (KDE) and the Kentucky Department for Behavioral Health, Developmental and Intellectual Disabilities (BHDID).
Sources of Strength is a student-led suicide prevention and mental health promotion program that offers training for youth and adults. The peer-led model includes building a community of strength by pairing adult advisors with peer leaders, who are students who have influence within their social group. Peer leaders help support well-being, help-seeking, healthy activities and a sense of belonging among students.
KDE staff go into schools to train peer leaders and teachers on the Sources of Strength model. Blake Konny, program consultant in KDE’s Office of Continuous Improvement and Support, said schools expressed interest in connecting with other schools and exchanging ideas.
“Our goal is to provide a space for peer leaders and adult advisors to come together, share ideas, learn and grow together,” Konny said.
Konny said the gathering doubled in size compared to the first summit last year. KDE and BHDID hosted students from 12 schools in the Pendleton County, Jessamine County, Fayette County, Green County, Augusta Independent and Elizabethtown Independent districts.
During the summit, students participated in teambuilding activities, games and discussions about their Sources of Strength campaigns and other efforts to raise awareness of mental health supports.
Shenoah Henson, a sophomore at Pendleton County High School, is a Sources of Strength peer leader at her school and said she enjoyed meeting and connecting with peer leaders from other schools.
“At events like this, you can make new friends and communicate with them and maybe ask them what their school does that maybe your school could do as an idea,” Henson said.
The Pendleton County school district has a Drug-Free Communities grant funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Sources of Strength is one of the programs implemented through the grant.
As part of Sources of Strength, students spread strategic messaging campaigns to engage and interact with students and apply messages throughout the school. Campaigns can include self-reflection, wall displays, social media and presentations, which can be integrated into classwork. These campaigns can change cultural dynamics within the school.
Henson has been involved with numerous campaigns supporting mental health, including one where students gave out items in school that contained a graphic showing an elephant to represent strength. Students put together a “thankfulness wall” where students could write things they were thankful for.
For another campaign, Henson and some classmates went to elementary schools in the district to read books and talk about kindness with students. At their high school, they handed out goodie bags and talked about mental health programs in classrooms.
Henson said she found out about the Sources of Strength program in middle school, and she liked that Sources of Strength focuses on making schools a better place.
“I like helping people, I like being kind to everyone, and I like showing up for people and being there for people,” Henson said. “I felt like schools should be a safe place.”
Abagail Lucius, a freshman at Pendleton County High School, found out about the program in middle school when she was involved in making a “power chain.” In her middle school’s cafeteria, students wrote something down that they were thankful for on a piece of paper, then stapled them all together to create the “power chain” across the entire cafeteria.
“Finding out about Sources of Strength was a nice thing because I love to help other people, and I think that’s what Sources of Strength is about; it’s about helping people,” Lucius said.
Christina Watford, education administration program consultant in KDE’s Office of Continuous Improvement and Support, leads a game of Simon Says during one of the breakout sessions as students try to balance cups on their heads or hands. Photo by Fiona Morgan, Kentucky Department of Education, Oct. 24, 2025
The Sources of Strength training model focuses on addressing mental health needs before people reach a crisis point by concentrating on eight protective factors: family support, positive friends, mentors, healthy activities, generosity, spirituality, physical health and mental health. Trainers usually encourage peer leaders to focus on promoting these strengths that can help students and their peers deal with stress and difficult times.
Henson said the peer leaders at her school are focusing on family support, positive friends, mentors and generosity this year.
A recent school spirit week theme was based on the movie “Inside Out,” which is about emotions that teenagers and younger children often experience. Lucius and Henson talked about emotions based on the theme of the movie to their fellow students. They did clothespin campaigns, where students write positive notes on clothespins and clip them to other people. Those people then clip them to others and the clothespins spread throughout the day.
Henson said her favorite thing about the summit is that she felt comfortable enough to open up to people.
“You’re not really judged here or anything like that, and you can really open up to people and learn that you are more alike in more ways than you think,” Henson said.
The keynote speaker at the Sources of Strength summit was Erin Horn, a national Sources of Strength coordinator and trainer. She shared a message to attendees that they can have a huge transformational influence on someone else by simply being a kind human.
“We want you to be an agent of change and a connector to help,” Horn said. “We want to invite you and empower you to make a more positive vibe in your school.”
Konny said KDE plans to continue hosting the summit each year in different locations across Kentucky.
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