'It’s literally life-saving.' Kansas teens support each other through mental health struggles

Zero Reasons Why began after a rise in teen suicides. Four years later there’s still work to be done, but officials say the program has contributed to a decline in suicides and an increase in young people reaching out for help.
Chad Harrell was a popular athlete, good student and a rising senior at Blue Valley North High in the summer of 2017. One night he came in late, and his parents grounded him. His mother, Sylvia Harrell, checked on him before she went to bed and found him dead in his room. He’d taken his own life.

“Had I had any inkling, this wouldn’t have happened,” Sylvia Harrell said in 2018. “I would have been outside his room. I would have had my radar up to watch out for this. We were blindsided because Chad Harrell didn’t make bad decisions. The one bad decision he made is horrific.”