PLAYING TO LIVE

Asheville, North Carolina, 28806 United States

Mission Statement

Playing to Live (PTL) works globally to build psychosocial and supportive arts programming in low resource, high-trauma communities through collaboration and partnerships with local community organizations. PTL’s focus is to work with community organizations in low resource settings to fill the gap in mental health services for children and communities. Research completed on past programming in Liberia demonstrated a statistically significant impact in reducing symptoms of psychosocial stress experienced by children over time exposed to the intervention.

About This Cause

The mission of PTL is to build effective and sustainable community-based expressive art programs, which target the psychosocial needs of children and communities facing trauma. We partner with local organizations to create culturally relevant trauma informed psychosocial programming and collaboratively work with community’s to build community run programming. PTL provides support and oversight including monitoring and evaluation to contribute to the body of research that indicates the need for creative mental health solutions to high trauma situations. There is a severe gap in response to mental health in low-resource, high trauma settings internationally. PTL is working to establish a three-tiered core training and program model to develop the capacity of essential psychosocial services to address this gap by partnering with community organizations, which in turn builds community skills and capacity. This core model is being built through a comprehensive review of evidence-based practice and programming investigation. This core model will follow an adaptation process. It will be implemented in multiple high trauma, low resource settings that can be adapted appropriately to meet the specific needs of that community. Our goal is to create a strong core program that successfully addresses these needs but is adaptable for the targeted community’s culture. Evidence has shown the detrimental impact childhood trauma can have on an individual. Exposure to trauma can greatly affect a child’s relationships, emotional regulation, and academic performance. This follows an individual throughout his/her lifetime, significantly impacting health, economic status, and quality of life. Evidence based mental health techniques have been proven to combat these detrimental effects, yet, despite evidence of a solution, there is still a significant gap in resources and access to vital services for children in low resource settings. PTL aims to be a leader in filling the mental health gap both nationally and internationally. We have witnessed the healing power of artistic expression for the individual child and his/her community, and we are committed to being at the forefront of research and practice to change the status quo and fill this gap in services for the children and communities currently left behind. We believe every child, adolescent, and community has the right not just to survive but also to thrive.

PLAYING TO LIVE
462 Sandhill Rd
Asheville, North Carolina 28806
United States
Phone 4236536393
Unique Identifier 472157352