Creighton’s Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC) launched the Jays Never Fly Alone initiative. The campaign seeks to increase awareness of mental health resources and dialogue on campus for both students and student-athletes.
Social media campaigns and a video project are on the list of short-term projects for the initiative, and junior defender Haylee Blach says further down the road they hope to work more with the Creighton Students Union to bridge the gap between student-athletes and the rest of campus.
“I just really like the idea of Jays Never Fly
Alone because in a community, you always want to be supported,” Blach said. She added that while student-athletes, as members of a team, often have that support system built in, many students may not feel that same support.
Senior goalkeeper Collin Valdivia said that the initiative is still young, so the current focus is on awareness and dialogue.
“I think that if we’re able to permeate [Jays Never Fly Alone] around campus, that would be the best thing,” he said.
The idea was spawned by a visit to the annual Big East Student-Athlete Well Being Forum at Providence College by committee members Valdivia and Blach. There, they listened to a variety of mental health speakers.
Following the forum, the idea of “Bluejays Never Fly Alone” was born. Valdivia said that the phrase was inspired in part from the Providence moniker, “You’re Never Alone in Friartown.”
The SAAC is a committee composed of student-athletes from each team serving as a connection between the NCAA, student-athletes and the rest of the student body. Blach is currently president of the SAAC.
Brandy Menaugh, associate athletic director for compliance and staff moderator of the SAAC, now in her tenth year at Creighton, spoke on the increased emphasis and importance Creighton Athletics has placed on mental health in recent years.
“Why is our mental health any less important than our physical health?”
Menaugh said she’s seen this trend occurring throughout Big East athletic programs as schools have invested more energy and re- sources to improve accessibility and reduce mental health stigma.
The initiative kicked off the beginning of this month with student-athletes tabling on campus and has been followed up with a social media campaign from the SAAC’s Twitter account.
Blach stressed the need to carry the conference’s momentum back to her own school. “When Collin and I were leaving [the conference] we’re like, okay, what can we do at Creighton to take back what we learned to make a difference?”