Resilience, Risk Reduction & Suicide Prevention
Our Mission:
- Motivate Service Members and Dependents to maintain physical, emotional, spiritual and psychological wellness through the enhancement of life skills
- Work to reduce the stigma associated with seeking help during a time of hardship or suicidal crisis
- Promote suicide awareness, crisis intervention training and resilience skills training
The Resilience, Risk Reduction & Suicide Prevention Program strives to increase the resilience of our force and decrease the rate of suicide within the Louisiana National Guard by working with internal programs and community resources.
Through Resilience and Suicide Prevention training, Service Members and family members can learn how to identify someone at risk of suicide and the actions needed to assist them. Being knowledgeable of your own level of resilience combined with the knowledge of at risk identifiers can allow for the prevention of suicidal behavior.
 R3SP Program Coordinator amber.n.sayer.civ@mail.mil (318) 290-5449 |  State Resilience Coordinator Jeremy.e.jackson.mil@mail.mil 318-290-5729 |  Suicide Prevention Program Manager (SPPM) emily.v.jarand.ctr@mail.mil (504) 278-8415 |
What do we know about suicide and the positive effects of resilience and suicide awareness training?
The Louisiana National Guard has experienced a number of Service Members lost to suicide. When a suicide occurs it does not affect just one person. Family Members, friends and co-workers are all touched and endure the long term effects.
There are many factors that contribute to suicide and are often deep rooted and very complex. Educating yourself on the signs of crisis and remaining resilient is a good start for combating suicide.
One of the greatest barriers to the prevention of suicide is the stigma that surrounds seeking help.
-Educate yourself and family members about the warning signs and resources. Suicide does not discriminate.
-Increase visibility and knowledge of resources
-Reinforce the battle buddy system
-Use what you learn in training and take action when worried about the possibility of suicide occurring.
-Through program implementation and training at all levels, Leaders and Soldiers gain the knowledge about warning signs of extreme stressors and suicide behavior and the resources available to their Soldiers and Family members in a time of need.
-The suicide prevention, intervention and resilience skills trainings enhance and develop a Soldier’s ability to initiate engagement and life-saving conversations from the moment an initial concern is presented.
-By routinely receiving these trainings and putting them to use, Soldiers will develop the confidence to initiate future interventions.
-These skills allow for Soldiers to practice self-care and coping skills in their own times of adversity as well as recognize their personal duty to be ready, willing and able to assist when a fellow Soldier needs support.
-Institutionally, continued utilization of these skills helps Soldiers develop a culture of trust, engagement and a sense of responsibility when in a leadership role.
-The action of helping is a cognitive process and research indicates that the action is dependent on a person’s ability to say “yes” during a critical moment.
Program Information
The Resilience, Risk Reduction and Suicide Prevention Program includes multiple components and each are vital to improving the lives of our Service Members and their families.
Deployment Cycle Resilience Training
Mandated training delivered during the Deployment Cycle to help deploying Soldiers, Family members and Leaders transition to and from the deployment mindset and prepare for challenges and changes.
ENGAGE
Targeted, awareness based training designed to discuss how values and beliefs play a role in helping those who need assistance. The course allows soldiers to discuss in open format how and when to intervene in potentially harmful or dangerous situations to help fellow soldiers or civilians and to create a climate of trust within the unit.Ask, Care, Escort
ACE is a 1 hour, Tier 1 model designed to empower participants to notice the warning signs, calmly control the situation and establish care and respect during an intervention and then escort that individual to professional or 911 resources.Ask, Care, Escort- Suicide Intervention
ACE-SI is a 3-4 hour, one time, career training for all E5-O3s. The curriculum is a tier 2 model that empowers first line leaders/supervisors to build onto their knowledge of the ACE model. Leaders will experience in class instruction, hypothetical scenario applications and group participation to explore prevention, intervention and postvention efforts within their units.Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training
ASIST is a 2 day class that helps to change the historical approach to suicide to a present day approach. Acknowledgment, openness, respectfulness, and understanding, along with the steps of the PAL model will give the participants opportunities to learn specific, life-assisting skills to help prevent persons with thoughts of suicide from acting upon those thoughts.Suicide Intervention Officer
Units are required to appoint two SIOs who are certified in both ACE-SI and ASIST to serve as the primary unit Suicide Prevention trainer and liaison with the LANG Suicide Prevention program.Resilience Trainer Assistance
Resilience training teaches Soldiers tools to grow and thrive in the face of challenges and bounce back from adversity. Unit MRTs are able to build on Resilience Competencies that enable mental toughness, optimal performance, strong leadership, and goal achievement. Skills training is required to be recorded in DTMS under the NGB, 730 day Task Numbers.
RTA Requirement: E-5 or above and attend a 25 hour block of MRT core competencies led by an MRT taught over no more than 3 consecutive days
Master Resilience Trainer
MRT Level 1 is a 10 day ATRRS course that certifies individuals to instruct unit level resilience skills training. Units are required to register in ATRRS after pre-approval from the State Resilience Coordinator.
MRT Requirement: E-6 to E-8, O-1 to O-3 or WO1 to CW4 and complete a 10-day ATRRS course coordinated through LANG R3SP
Resources
Unit ASIST trained personnel
Commander or 1SG
Chaplain
Local Vet Center www.vetcenter.va.gov
Louisiana 2-1-1 resource services: www.louisiana211.org
Survivor Outreach Services www.facebook.com/LouisianaArmySurvivorOutreachServices
Contact Us
Suicide Prevention Program Manager is a contractor employed by Dynamic Systems Technology Inc.