Mental health is an extremely important issue, which unfortunately isn't dealt with very well in schools across the UK. Despite the fact that over one in ten young people under the age of 16 have a mental health issue and nine out of ten of these face discrimination and stigma because of it, we are still living in a society highly uneducated on these issues. I think it is important that young people are taught about mental health from a young age, including who they can talk to and how they can help others. The amount of pages dedicated to self-harm, depression, anxiety and eating disorders etc. on popular social networking sites such as Tumblr, Instagram and Twitter are phenomenal, however not highly surprising, when they don't know where else to turn for support. However support is not always enough. We need to be addressing these problems at their roots and this is where education is largely important. If we were talking about issues such as eating disorders and depression in schools then young people would feel less afraid to reach out for support and inform others that they were suffering.

The idea for my campaign stemmed from a conference I attended a few years ago about mental health and mental health awareness, especially amongst young people. Shockingly, many people there hadn't really heard much about these issues before this conference, as education on these issues is practically non-existent. It wasn't until a few days ago that I heard of this site and realised how easily I could get my message across. This is a petition very close to my heart and I hope you will take just a few seconds to sign it and help me to achieve a much more educated society, where people feel able to reach out for support, without feeling afraid of being judged.

All it takes is a few seconds of your time to sign this petition and help make a change that can not only help millions of people across the UK, but potentially save lives.

Thank you.