“It’s something that people all struggle with, but no one really talks about,” Jennings Brooks said about mental health.
Brooks, a senior journalism major, recently co-founded I Got Your Back Apparel with longtime friend and current University of Michigan senior Audrey Smit as a creative way to promote conversation surrounding mental health and suicide awareness.
Both Brooks and Smit said they have experience with people who have struggled with mental health and classmates that have died from suicide. This is what later inspired them to create their apparel company.
“It's been something that’s resonated in our hearts for a long time,” Brooks said.
They both said that they operate very differently — Smit described herself as more logistically wired while Brooks tends to be more creative. But Brooks said that they are both artistic, which motivated their interest in starting an apparel business.
“That is how “I Got Your Back” came up because we were thinking about the back of the jacket and having someone’s back,” Smit said. After more brainstorming, the idea of having other apparel options like T-shirts and bandanas seemed doable and more financially feasible.
All apparel options have the signature “IGYB” painted or embroidered with the jackets including the number for the national suicide prevention lifeline. The profits from these items go toward The JED Foundation, a nonprofit that aims to prevent suicide and empower young adults to address their mental health.
Smit and Brooks said they ultimately chose The JED Foundation because they were transparent about their funds, catered to their age group as well as younger age groups and seemed to have a personal touch. Brooks said she particularly likes the substance abuse intervention aspect, especially for college students.
“This was the cherry on top — that the University of Georgia was about to become a JED campus,” Brooks said. According to the UGA office of Student Affairs, the university began the Healthy Minds study in December of last year as a part of the new partnership with the foundation, making UGA en route to become a JED campus.
A JED campus entails the set-up of a four-year partnership between the university and the foundation in which JED helps to establish an effective system that supports individual students and the campus community as a whole. Some of the aspects of the program include a mental health strategic plan, two administrations of the Healthy Mind study to assess students’ awareness of emotional wellbeing and substance issues and support via a JED Campus Advisor.
Junior accounting major Katie Hartigan went to high school with both Smit and Brooks, and she recently purchased from IGYB. She said that upon discovering IGYB, she also was introduced to the JED foundation and its mission.
“I thought it was a great idea to make apparel with this intention of raising awareness about mental health and suicide,” Hartigan said. “It’s such a visible way to inform people about this [issue] that’s happening and has taken so many from a number of people.”
Hartigan said every time she’s worn her IGYB shirt, she’s gotten questions about what the letters stand for. She said she loves the design and its ability to spread mental health awareness on campus.
Brooks and Smit hope that in the future, they will be able to give 100% of the proceeds to the JED Foundation and have a partner to financially support them. Brooks said they would also like to work with kids or different shelters in the future.
“Just getting more people involved besides the two of us because it is I think, such a thing that we really need to get our community involved in,” Brooks said.
