Luton Mall celebrates huge funds for The OLLIE Foundation to provide suicide intervention courses

In 2018 The Mall teamed up with The OLLIE Foundation, of St Albans, to help its mission to provide suicide alertness and intervention training courses.

Now, thanks to the huge amount of money raised by staff and shoppers, the charity is able to offer new classes in Harpenden and provide them for free.

Lavinia Douglass, marketing manager at The Mall , Luton, said: “It’s great to see fundraising efforts from The Mall Cares Charity of the Year Programme being put to such great use in the community.

“We worked very closely with The OLLIE Foundation to help both increase awareness of the foundation and mental health difficulties.”

Verity Bramwell, coordinator at The OLLIE Foundation, said: “We’re very grateful for the partnership we had with The Mall and so pleased to be able to offer free suicide alertness and intervention training courses as a direct result.”

The safeTALK alertness training will be taking place on Sunday, May 26, from 10am – 1.30pm at Harpenden’s Young People’s Centre. safeTALK is a half-day alertness training that prepares anyone aged 15 or over, regardless of prior experience or training, to become a suicide-alert helper.

The OLLIE Foundation will also be running a two-way interactive workshop in suicide first aid on May 30 and 31, and June 15 and 16 from 9.30am – 5pm again at Harpenden’s Young People’s Centre.

The Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training (ASIST) course helps to teach participants to recognise when someone may have thoughts of suicide and work with them to support their immediate safety.

Call 07715 311891.