Times Observer photo by Brian Ferry This Mental Health Awareness Month billboard near the intersection of Route 62 and Hatch Run Road in North Warren features an image and message by Ashley Peterson.

The signs are everywhere.

Growing up is hard. Young people today face many challenges.

Youth mental health was flagged by the Surgeon General as a public health crisis in 2021.

May is Mental Health Awareness Month and Warren County School District students are sharing their messages.

Six billboards have been erected around Warren County. CORE — Choosing Openness Regarding Experience — has been purchasing billboard space in May (Mental Health Awareness Month) and September (Suicide Prevention Month) since 2018.

“CORE wanted a larger platform to raise awareness of mental health and suicide prevention,” Founder Kari Swanson said.

In 2020, CORE asked art teachers to have student volunteers participate in a contest to design the May billboards. CORE designed the billboards before that and continued to design the September billboards for the past two years because students were just arriving back in school. This year, students could submit entries for May, September, or both.

They are intended to help people understand that not everyone’s mental health looks the same as everyone else’s. Kendra McBride’s work — in Sugar Grove — explains that we’re all “Wired different.”

We are different because we are individuals. And individuality is to be celebrated, not hidden. “Stand up. Stand out,” Fawne Hackman says on her sign on Route 6 in Youngsville.

“I would say the goal is to remind people of our community that they are not alone,” Swanson said. “People care and they need to talk about what they are experiencing in order to get to feel better. I would say the goal is also to remind people that we are all going through life together but experience it differently, so be kind, encouraging and supportive of others.”

It is better to “Choose joy,” as Sydney Smead says on her sign on Route 6 at the Sheffield schools, than to put yourself or someone else down.

Everyone has mental health. In some, it works against them, but it does not need to define them. “You are not your mental illness. You are so much more,” Madison Lyle says in her sign at the end of the Glade Bridge in Warren.

“The message collectively is that you are not defined by whatever diagnosis you may have or whatever struggle you are dealing with and that others want you to know you matter and you are perfect just the way you are,” Swanson said.

“I like you just the way you are,” is the message on Logan Johnson’s sign on Mohawk Avenue.

“I am always amazed every year to see the talent our youth has but to also see mental health from the point of view of our youth is inspiring,” Swanson said. “I hope that when someone sees these billboards they remember the message. Some of them are very powerful.”

“It has been a great thing for our art students to do to show their talent along with the community to see the messages that our students would like to send to our community regarding these important topics,” she said.

All of the artists who submitted art for the contests have been asked to join a mental health awareness float featuring all of the works of art in this year’s Fourth of July Parade, Swanson said.

The past three years have been tough on mental health across the board. The Warren County School District community has been hit hard.

Nationwide, both the number of young people who have experienced persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness and the number of youth who have reported making a suicide plan have increased by at least 40 percent from 2009 to 2019, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“We don’t know what another person is battling inside,” Swanson said. “If these billboards make a difference in one person’s day or decision-making processes then I am thrilled and they have done their jobs.”

Growing up is tough enough. Young people don’t need to go out of their way to make it harder.

Ashley Peterson’s message at Hatch Run and Route 62 in North Warren is a letter. “Dear me, Don’t be so hard on yourself. You’re doing OK.”