The office of Fulton County Board of Commissioners Vice Chairman Bob Ellis and Fulton County Schools have officially kicked off the area’s Text 4 Help program, an anonymous crisis texting line for teens reaching out for advice on issues that are troubling them. It will now be offered in 10 high schools across the school district.
School administrators and representatives from the Fulton County Office of Behavioral Health & Developmental Disabilities were on hand Friday, October 26, 2018 at City Springs, Sandy Springs’ City Hall, to learn more on how the program links young people with licensed professionals who can assist them.
“This partnership with our schools gives Fulton County the chance to connect kids experiencing challenging problems with those professionals uniquely trained to intervene,” says Fulton County District 2 Commissioner and Vice Chairman Bob Ellis. “Kids may be in crises ranging from academic issues to substance abuse to depression, and Text 4 Help could be the lifeline they need.”
Vice Chairman Ellis introduced the texting initiative in Fulton County after the success of the program launched by Linking Efforts Against Drugs (LEAD), a non-profit agency in the Chicago area. Text 4 Help allows teens to reach a licensed clinician who will respond within three minutes, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. When a school establishes a program, it selects a unique ID code that students can identify with to accompany the phone number. Texts are routed through a cloaking server to ensure anonymity.
The partnership with Fulton County Schools was launched in January 2018 in several high schools and will now include Alpharetta, Banneker, Cambridge, Chattahoochee, Johns Creek, Langston Hughes, Milton, Riverwood, Roswell and Tri-Cities High Schools. Both Fulton County and the school district hope to eventually expand the program into all 19 FCS high schools. The Text 4 Help line is funded by a grant from the Fulton-DeKalb Hospital Authority.
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