Coppell High School’s Hope Squad is meant to spread positivity throughout campus. Hope Squad started at CHS9 and New Tech High @ Coppell, but last year expanded to CHS and other schools.
This year’s members have made efforts to expand their initiatives to other schools. They have traveled to CHS9 and Canyon Creek Elementary School to help spread mental health awareness.
Delosha Payne, the Hope Squad adviser for CHS and CHS9, thinks if you take care of a student’s emotional and mental state, the student will have a better academic life. Hope squad teaches how to deal with mental health issues with peer support.
“I would eventually like to be able to take our squads and go do something that’s mental health awareness related on an elementary level,” Payne said. “Students of all ages deal with mental health things. And so being able to take what we’re learning and package it for an elementary student or middle school students, I think it’s a very valuable service.”
The foundational idea of Hope Squad is important for people of all ages. Mental health should be an acceptable topic to talk about no matter where you are. According to Payne, the most important lesson she has learned as a Hope Squad advisor is listening to the students, and taking in what they are saying and not only taking it in, but taking it in and giving them space to air it all out.
”Hearing from students in their own words about their own personal struggles or struggles they’ve witnessed with friends or family has been the most impactful. As a teacher, I want to be mindful of that, even though I have this content or this curriculum that I’ve got to get to them,” Payne said. “So I think the biggest thing that I’ve just learned from Hope Squad is that even though you guys are kids, y’all are still dealing with your own things and we as teachers need to, we need to understand that.”
The Hope Squad members seek to help and do good things for their school. Junior Hope Squad co-director Anuva Kaura said that she has a lot of close friends that she’s made over the years in Hope Squad and she likes how everyone is just a positive and caring person. They generally want to spread positivity throughout the campus and try to make everyone feel included.
“I would love for Hope Squad to expand outside of Coppell, for example, maybe write letters to nursing homes, do volunteer work,” Kaura said. “But for this year’s Hope Squad, I want to make a more direct and personal influence on our classmates and the student body.”
Hope Squad is always growing and improving. It’s a connection between students that can help the student body thrive
(Rachel Chio)
“We want to make sure everyone’s included and everyone’s getting the same knowledge that we want to offer to them,” junior Hope Squad co-director Ruth Matthews said. “Everyone should feel like their mental health matters and I really hope that by doing this we see able to at least make sure everyone here has heard of us and our message, so that for years coming, they know that someone on this campus cares for them,”
No matter who or where you are in school, you do have somebody to talk to. Whether it’s administration, whether it’s teachers, whether it’s Hope Squad or the student body in general. You are not alone.
“Me and the rest of Hope Squad, we all have the same goal, which is we don’t want [students]to feel like [they] don’t have someone that doesn’t care, that won’t listen, because we will be there to listen,” Matthews said. “Teachers will be there to listen. Staff, counselors, APs, [Principal Laura Springer], they will all be there to help you and listen. So you will always have someone on this campus.”
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