The Kim Foundation Update

Our team has hit the ground running in 2017! One of our goals was to continue reaching out into the community starting the conversation about mental health and suicide prevention. We have had several multi-day presentations in high schools and middle schools, and had great engagement from the students. We’ve distributed thousands of bracelets, resource cards, and stress balls promoting 13minutes.org and Suicide Lifeline. And my favorite thing of all from these presentations is that we have had meaningful interaction with students in our community where we are able to hear their real stories and concerns about the issues they are facing.

We did our first webinar as well as our first suicide prevention training with foster parents. We have continued planning the first ever Nebraska State LOSS Conference with the help of many partners. We’ve taken a part in the Nebraska State Health Improvement Plan as well as the Systems of Care Communications subgroup. We are planning two community events with local school districts and preparing for an interactive presentation at the National Council for Behavioral Health Conference in Seattle. All of this and it’s only February!

In addition to all of that excitement, we are in the initial stages of creating a new website that will launch this summer. We are so grateful to our marketing team that is guiding us through this process and allowing us to have a cleaner, updated, and interactive site. We can’t wait! Watch for more on this in the coming months. We are also undergoing a three to five year strategic plan process and we are thrilled with the developments and direction we have already established. We are looking at ways of creating a deeper connection throughout Nebraska while maintaining our core focus on mental health and suicide prevention.

Two other exciting developments at the foundation…we have added a fourth team member! Janae Shillito will join us as another Project Coordinator. Watch for more to come in our March newsletter when we officially introduce her. Lastly, please save the date! Our fall event has been set for Tuesday, October 24^th at Embassy Suites LaVista from 11:30am – 1:00pm. We have an exciting speaker lined up who has a unique delivery of his message around living with a mental illness. We will leave you with that teaser for now, but watch for more to come and make sure to mark your calendar!

Julia Hebenstreit, Executive Director of The Kim Foundation

Julia Hebenstreit is the Executive Director of The Kim Foundation. She received her J.D. from Creighton University in 2005, and her BS in Journalism from the University of Nebraska Omaha in 2002. She has been with The Kim Foundation since 2011, and prior to that worked for local non-profits doing development, strategic planning, communications and advancement. She has a passion for helping people and improving lives, and serves on the Executive Committee for Nebraska Association of Behavioral Health Organizations, as the 2015 Hill Day State Captain for the state of Nebraska, and as an active member of the Nebraska Suicide Prevention Coalition, the Early Childhood Mental Health Coalition, BHECN Advisory Committee, RESPECT Advisory Board, Connections Advisory Board and the Project Propel Planning Group.