Led by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF) Global Center for Child and Adolescent Mental Health at the Child Mind Institute in partnership with the South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC), the summit features mental health experts and young leaders from South Africa and globally
New York, USA and Cape Town, South Africa — The next generation of young changemakers will join mental health professionals and policy experts from South Africa and internationally to fundamentally reimagine how youth mental health systems function. The theme of the upcoming expert gathering will be “Beyond the Table: Youth as Co-Creators in Change for Mental Health.” The event will take place November 24-25 in Cape Town and is organized by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF) Global Center for Child and Adolescent Mental Health at the Child Mind Institute in partnership with the South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC).
The SNF Global Center’s work across South Africa operates through its Child and Adolescent Mental Health Initiative (CAMHI South Africa), in partnership with SAMRC. CAMHI South Africa supports the mental wellbeing of young people by expanding access to effective mental health services and resources by partnering with youth, building the capacity of professionals and community-based workers, and promoting innovative, culturally responsive solutions.
The objective of the expert gathering is to contextualize global conversations into targeted, localized action while deepening stakeholder engagement across multiple sectors to generate co-created implementation strategies. It also aims to challenge outdated methodologies, which have historically excluded youth from decision-making processes on issues that directly affect their lives. Focus areas include:
- Improving integration of mental health support within existing school systems
- Strengthening community-based prevention programs
- Developing culturally appropriate training models for non-specialist providers
- Developing culturally responsive assessment tools.
Each of these prioritized areas directly address critical gaps and issues identified by youth and local partners.
The two-day summit will include panel discussions on anti-stigma strategies, the role of multidisciplinary partnerships, co-development of initiatives with youth, as well as the study of current mental health narratives and areas of improvement.
Dialogue will be led by representatives from the South African government, clinicians, educational institutions, and impactful community-based organizations. The youth mental health leaders in attendance include members of the SNF Global Center Youth Council in South Africa and the South Africa Federation for Mental Health Youth Advocacy Forum. These young experts will also initiate discussions and share insights alongside their international peers to accelerate solutions.
“The SNF Global Center’s collaborative approach to the expert gathering exemplifies our commitment to strengthening youth mental health systems globally,” says Jason Bantjes, professor at SAMRC and the SNF Global Center’s scientific lead in South Africa. “It’s time to further mobilize collective action to dismantle barriers that perpetuate mental health inequities. This critical moment demands we transform how we show up for young people — moving beyond fragmented approaches to create unified pathways where policymakers, practitioners and communities work together to implement solutions that reflect young people’s lived experiences.”
Tendani Tsedu, head of the Corporate and Marketing Communications department at SAMRC, says the event also directs important attention towards the ongoing challenges young people are navigating during a critical phase of human development. This includes experiencing heightened vulnerability to environmental factors that shape their mental health.
“In South Africa, the environmental forces include exposure to the effects of poverty and violence,” he explains. “This collaboration is a timely effort to create a bridge that enables progress for mental health — an advanced and well-validated instrument with a large nationally representative sample of young people. It will provide us with reliable data about the prevalence of child and adolescent mental health conditions in the country.”
1 in 5 young people experience mental health and learning challenges globally. And with current limitations on access to services and critical gaps in relevant data, particularly across low-and middle-income countries (LMICs), this summit is timely and essential.
Expected outcomes of the expert gathering include practical solutions and actionable frameworks derived from structured knowledge-sharing and substantive youth engagement. This forward-looking approach seeks to directly address the urgent need for strengthened cross-sector collaboration, comprehensive capacity building, and open-science frameworks. Culturally anchored solutions recognize local contexts as essential to successful systems transformation.
By tackling the persistent disconnect between mental health approaches and lived realities of youth and communities, the SNF Global Center, SAMRC, and partners continue to identify and develop authentic pathways towards long-term system transformation and workforce development.
About the SNF Global Center at the Child Mind Institute
The SNF Global Center brings together the Child Mind Institute’s expertise as a leading independent nonprofit in children’s mental health and the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF)’s deep commitment to supporting collaborative projects to improve access to quality health care worldwide. The center is building partnerships to drive advances in under-researched areas of children and adolescents’ mental health, and expand access to culturally appropriate training, resources, and treatment in low- and middle-income countries. This work is conducted by the Child Mind Institute with support from SNF through its Global Health Initiative (GHI).
About the Child Mind Institute
The Child Mind Institute is dedicated to transforming the lives of children and families struggling with mental health and learning disorders by giving them the help they need. We’ve become the leading independent nonprofit in children’s mental health by providing gold-standard, evidence-based care, delivering educational resources to millions of families each year, training educators in underserved communities, and developing tomorrow’s breakthrough treatments.
About the South African Medical Research Council
The SAMRC was established in 1969 and is dedicated to improving the health of people in South Africa, through research, innovation, development, and technology transfer. The scope of research includes laboratory investigations, clinical research, and public health studies. The includes research on South Africa’s quadruple burden of disease: maternal, newborn and child health, HIV/AIDS and TB, non-communicable diseases, and interpersonal violence.
link
