Champions of Change
Suicide Awareness Voices of Education is a national nonprofit agency that has been working to prevent suicide since 1989. Beginning as a grassroots, all volunteer organization fueled by the pain and passion of family members who lost a loved one to suicide, in our early days SAVE was the original clearinghouse for general information on suicide. We then grew into coordinating some of the first suicide survivor support groups in the nation and held the first National Suicide Survivors Day. We are a founding member of the National Council for Suicide Prevention and today SAVE is one of the leading suicide prevention organizations in the country. Using multimedia public awareness campaigns, education and training programs for communities, military personnel and professionals, SAVE works to reduce stigma and empower individuals, communities and systems on how to save lives. Many of SAVE’s programs have been recognized on the Best Practices Registry, including LEADS (Linking Education and Awareness of Depression and Suicide), a high school based, interactive curriculum, Parents as Partners and What to Do: A Youth Guide to Suicide Prevention. SAVE is also a resource for those touched by suicide when a tragedy has occurred through support, grief and memorial programs. SAVE’s Executive Director, Dr. Daniel Reidenberg, is a national expert in suicide prevention and mental health. He is also the Managing Director of the National Council for Suicide Prevention and serves on numerous committees and workgroups including steering committees of the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, the Suicide Prevention Resource Center; the US Representative to the International Association for Suicide Prevention; Editorial Advisory Boards of the American Psychotherapy Association (Chair), Reachout.com and Esperanza magazine. The organization today is run by a small staff of 6 and over 250 volunteers who actively help us reach over 75 million people a year with awareness messaging on suicide prevention; over 15,000 through education and training; distribution of over 60,000 materials annually and over 100,000 hits per month from over 150 countries worldwide at www.save.org.