Tomorrow is a new day

Suicide it is an uncomfortable subject.

However, for one University of Lethbridge student the conversation is necessary.

“It’s a bigger issue than I think a lot of people are aware of,” said Bethany Woytkiw. “Whether you’re being directly impacted by that or you know people, everyone at some point in their lives is going to be connected to that sort of situation.”

The 22-year-old has been touched by suicide within her own family. To help spread the message about the importance of mental health, she joined the schools suicide awareness and prevention campaign.

“My driving force is that I have a lot of people that have been impacted by mental health issues and I never want them to get to that point where suicide becomes a thought for them.”

The university’s Student Success Centre and Health Centre started the campaign last year. It allows students to create art pieces surrounding the subject of suicide. This year’s theme is “Tomorrow is a New Day”.

“We want to have a positive outlook, but at the same time acknowledging that maybe today isn’t so good. We have hope that tomorrow is going to be a good day, tomorrow is going to be a better day,” said Auburn Phillips, U of L Mental Health Educator.

She added that suicide is the second leading cause of death amongst university and college students.

“We know that it’s a higher risk population,” she said. “It’s something we want to be aware of and make sure we’re being proactive and trying to be there for our students as much as possible.”

Woytkiw’s piece is called ‘perspective is everything’, a philosophy she tries to live by every day.

“If you’re having a bad day, if you’re having a good day just being able to look at things from the most positive perspective is really important,” she said.

Each artwork is auctioned off by the school with all proceeds going to the Supporting Our Students scholarship fund. Bidding for the artworks can be done in person at University Hall or on the Student Success Centre’s Facebook page.