Follow the yellow bench: Donated bench invites students to talk about mental health

By Rosie Smith

Rocket Lighthouse presents yellow bench outside of the counselor’s office to encourage peer to peer support for students’ mental health.

In June, Chrystel Wells, one of McNick’s chemistry teachers and head of Rocket Lighthouse (formerly Hope Squad), spent 6-8 hours talking to Cindy Nadelbach about her son, Josh Nadelbach, who struggled with mental health and died by suicide in his mid-twenties. “The Josh’s Benches for Awareness Corporation” is a non-profit organization for mental health, as well as suicide prevention and awareness, and they are the group who donated the yellow bench to McNicholas.

Wells explained that the purpose for this bench is for students to physically sit down and talk with one another, “so that we can bring [awareness of caring for our mental health] to everybody’s attention and find spots where students feel sitting and talking,” Wells said.

“It [the bench] is somewhere where it’s safe to go and talk,” Wells added. “I really want to see more students using it; I want it to be a gathering place for conversation and connection.”