GREEN RIVER — For the third year in a row, every senior at Green River High School will receive a free pair of cowboy boots next week as a part of the Jae Foundation’s goal to change how students talk about mental health.

The Jae Foundation provides boots to graduating seniors as a way to spark “boot check” moments, conversations between students and peers about how they’re really doing.

Jessica Demaret, the foundation’s sponsor at the high school, and Madelynn Thomas, a senior and Jae Foundation ambassador, discussed the program Wednesday on KYCS’s School Talk.

The foundation was started in Pinedale and is named after Jae Bing, who died by suicide in 2016. A friend started the foundation afterward with the goal of opening conversations about mental health.

Seniors receiving boots also go through a 90-minute presentation focused on the importance of talking about mental health and on creating boot check habits, checking in with themselves or with others on Wednesdays, when students wear their boots.

Thomas said she applied to become an ambassador after friends confided they were struggling with suicidal thoughts and she didn’t know how to help.

“I wasn’t equipped to deal with their suicidal ideation and how they were feeling,” Thomas said. “So I started doing some research into the Jae Foundation and how I could create those moments of talking about their feelings.”

Thomas said she went through a week-long training camp in Daniel with the foundation’s founders, including people who knew Bing personally. She picked up her own boots in July at the cowboy store in Pinedale that belongs to Bing’s parents.

“I think half of us were crying in the back of the room,” Thomas said. “Just being in that location and having his family there and their friends, and they started getting emotional. And we started crying.”

Demaret said the program requires significant fundraising, roughly tens of thousands of dollars a year, and relies on community partners and support from the district’s central office to sustain it.

This year Green River High School is serving as a hub, with students from other areas traveling to Green River to receive their boots as well. They said they expect to set up between 700 and 800 pairs of boots for display, with help from student volunteers from groups including National Honor Society and the football and volleyball teams.

Thomas credited both the Jae Foundation and the school’s Hope Squad program with shifting how students talk about mental health since she started at GRHS as a freshman.

“There’s less of a taboo on the suicide topic,” Thomas said. “I’ve heard people in the hallway go, ‘Hey, you’re wearing your Jae boots. Are you okay?'”

Hope Squad, which works alongside the Jae Foundation on mental health awareness at the school, will host its annual Hope Week Sept. 21-25 under the theme “Hope in Action.” Dani Deters, GRHS’s lead Hope Advisor and social worker, is leading this year’s Hope Week, which is designed to promote mental health awareness, connection and suicide prevention.

The Hope Squad is inviting families and community members to join students at a series of evening events:

• Chalk Night: Monday, Sept. 21, at 7 p.m.
• Studio Night: Tuesday, Sept. 22, from 6 to 8 p.m.
• Hope Week 5K Fun Run/Walk: Wednesday, Sept. 23, at 6 p.m. at GRHS. Community resource tables will be set up outside the school during the event.
• Mind Jar & Craft Night: Thursday, Sept. 24, from 6 to 7 p.m.

Hope Squad will also sell T-shirts during the week to raise money for its awareness efforts, with a purchase link expected to be released soon.

Demaret said the Jae Foundation doesn’t track suicides prevented, since that isn’t something that can be measured directly. Instead, she pointed to the conversations the program has generated, including instances where an ambassador brought a concern to an adult.