#RamsTalk raises a voice (and support) for mental health

There is a stigma that surrounds mental health issues that often leads those experiencing symptoms to suffer in silence. Nella Brodett (Business Management, ’15) has been working hard to change that. Four years ago, she started #RamsTalk, an annual event and social media campaign to raise money and awareness for mental illness.

“As someone who has gone through the process and was able to get help right away, I want that level of support to exist on a provincial and federal level,” says Brodett, who suffered from depression when she was captain of the women’s hockey team at Ryerson University.

It was thanks to the attention and encouragement from her teammates that Brodett reached out to a counselor at the school. Later, it was a teammate again that helped give birth to the first #RamsTalk campaign.

Cassie Sharp brought the idea of #RamsTalk to Brodett to raise money for Do It For Daron (DIFD), an organization that formed in the wake of the death of Daron Richardson, a young hockey player whose suicide in 2010 shocked the minor hockey world. The teammates organized an intramural game for the Ryerson community, and Ryerson Athletics donated five cents for every tweet that used the #RamsTalk hashtag.

The first year of the campaign was a greater success than anyone expected, with other universities across Canada getting involved, garnering over 45,000 tweets, retweets and favourites, and raising $2,250. The next year, the Brookfield Institute for Innovation + Entrepreneurship (BII+E) came on board and proceeds doubled.

This spring will mark the fifth year of the campaign, and the first year scholarships will be offered thanks to BII+E: one for a student athlete working to overcome mental health challenges; the other for a student athlete who has assisted a teammate suffering from a mental illness to find help.

“We have living testimony saying this campaign saves lives,” says Brodett. “We’ve engaged hundreds of thousands of people. We’ve given them a voice and forum,” she adds. “That’s a number I want to grow, and the impact I want us to have.”