Friday, January 23, 2026

The program for the second day will include an array of powerful presentations that engage clinicians and suicide prevention advocates to enhance their knowledge and skills to prevent suicide. Attendees will hear the latest in research about suicide and risk assessment as well as evidenced-based treatments and prevention strategies to better serve individuals and communities at risk. The program will also include the stories of loss and attempt survivors and their journeys through grief to hope.

SCHEDULE OF EVENTS:

7:30-8:00am REGISTRATION, RESOURCE GALLERY & COMPLIMENTARY BREAKFAST

8:00-8:15am WELCOME & INTRODUCTION – Jennifer Fair Margraf, MBA, CFRE, Executive Director

8:15-9:15am KEYNOTE 1: Overview of Extreme Risk Protection Orders in Michigan and the Relevant Research – April Zeoli, PhD, MPH, Associate Professor, University of Michigan
Zeoli will provide a brief overview of Michigan’s extreme risk protection order (ERPO) law, often called a red flag law, and its use in Michigan, specifying who can file a petition and how it is filed. She will also share research findings on ERPO, including how it’s used in other states, who the respondents to the order are, and outcomes of the orders.

9:15-9:30am BREAK

9:30-10:30am MORNING BREAKOUT SESSIONS:

• Building Safety Through Empathy: The Counselor’s Role in Safety Planning Through a Rogerian Lense – Maggie Sweeney, PLC, Private Practice Counselor and Suicide Prevention Consultant, Mind Body Solutions LLC and Hope Network
  This presentation will explore how the six core factors of Rogerian therapy—congruence, unconditional positive regard, empathetic understanding, openness, genuineness, and acceptance—can be integrated into the process of safety planning with clients who are struggling with suicidal thoughts and desires. Emphasizing the counselor’s active participation, we will discuss how these factors create a collaborative, supportive environment that fosters trust and promotes meaningful engagement. Rather than seeing safety planning as a mere checklist or liability reducing paperwork, we will highlight how it can be a dynamic, client-centered process that prioritizes emotional connection and the client’s unique needs. Attendees will gain insight into how the counselor’s authentic presence and empathetic understanding can empower clients to participate in their own safety planning, ultimately increasing the likelihood of long-term success. The session will also address practical strategies for counselors to apply these principles in real-time during safety planning conversations, with an emphasis on enhancing client autonomy and ensuring the plan is both realistic and empowering.
  
  
• Beyond “Denies SI/HI:” Conducting and Utilizing Risk Assessments to Improve Patient Care – Layla Soliman, MD, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, Atrium Health/Wake Forest University School of Medicine – Charlotte Region
  This session will focus on the purpose of risk assessments, approaches to conducting risk assessments, and approaches to documentation.  We will also discuss some clinical strategies for navigating high risk situations.  These include managing countertransference, sensitive gathering of collateral data, and working within the limits of local resources.
• Aging, Dementia, and Suicide Risk: Protecting Senior Mental Health & Wellness – Doree Ann Espiritu, MD, Director, Behavioral Health Integration with Primary Care, Henry Ford Health
  The presentation will address how aging and dementia increase the risk for suicide especially with psychiatric comorbidities.   Furthermore, it will also go over the protective factors and the interventions needed in order to prevent suicide and promote wellness in the older adult population.
• Extreme Risk Protection Order (ERPO) – Richard C. Fuller III, BS, Sheriff, Kalamazoo County Sheriff’s Office, Danielle Hagaman-Clark and Jessica Roche
  This session will examine the implementation of Extreme Risk Protection Orders (ERPO) in Michigan. Participants will explore the challenges, successes, and lessons learned from Michigan’s experience with ERPOs to date. The session will also feature diverse perspectives from law enforcement, attorneys, and community advocates on the ERPO process, examining areas for improvement and how the implementation of this important law can continue to evolve for greater effectiveness in preventing gun violence.
• Grieving Out Loud – Heather Williams, MA, LPC, Founder, Southern Wellness Co.
  In this powerful presentation, a suicide loss survivor shares her personal journey of navigating profound grief and loss. Through storytelling, she will reflect on the early challenges of bereavement and illustrate how “grieving out loud” became a meaningful coping strategy and pathway toward healing. The session will explore how open expressions of grief fostered connection, community, and a continuing bond with her loved one. Attendees – including clinicians, caregivers, and community members – will gain deeper insight into the lived experience of suicide loss and learn ways to offer compassionate, informed support to survivors.

10:30-10:45am BREAK

10:45-11:45am KEYNOTE 2: New Generation Treatments to Prevent Suicide – Craig Bryan, PsyD, ABPP, Professor & Director of the Suicide Care Clinic, University of Vermont Larner College of Medicine
The United States’ suicide rate has increased steadily since 1999, despite expanded efforts to identify at-risk individuals and connect them with mental health treatments and interventions, prompting researchers to develop, test, and refine new treatment methods. In contrast to traditional approaches that view suicide risk as a symptom or outcome of psychiatric disorders, newer generation treatments view suicidal behavior as a transdiagnostic behavior that results from distinct mechanisms and processes. This approach has significantly improved the effectiveness of newer generation treatments relative to typical mental health treatments. Two interventions in particular, brief cognitive behavioral therapy for suicide prevention (BCBT) and crisis response planning (CRP), have been shown to reliably reduce suicidal behaviors in multiple randomized clinical trials. This presentation provides an overview of these interventions.

11:45am-1:00pm LUNCH

12:30-1:00pm LUNCHEON SPEAKERS: State of Community Mental Health in Michigan – Dana Lasenby, Chief Executive Director, Oakland Community Health Network, Traci Smith, Chief Executive Officer, Macomb County Community Mental Health, and James E. White, President and CEO, Detroit Wayne Integrated Health Network

1:00-1:15pm BREAK

1:15-2:15pm KEYNOTE 3: The Path Beyond the Crisis: Finding Possibilities for Growth –DeQuincy Lezine, PhD, Director, Lived Experience Academy
How do we build on crisis stabilization to create futures with positive potential? This session explores what can come after successful prevention of suicidal behavior: a path to recovery, resilience, and growth.  The presentation introduces the concept of Post-Suicidal Growth (PSG), a path for achieving it, and the lessons from the decades of research on Post-Traumatic Growth (PTG). Drawing on lived experience, research, and clinical insight, this session examines how individuals with lived experience (from their own experiences or from friends and family) can pursue meaningful life changes after crisis resolution.

2:15-2:30pm BREAK

2:30-3:30pm AFTERNOON BREAKOUT SESSIONS:

• AI and Suicide Prevention: Opportunity and Challenges – Rajiv Tandon, MD., Professor of Psychiatry, Western Michigan University Homer Stryker School of Medicine
  In the context of the enormous public health problem of suicide, current clinical approaches are proving inadequate. There are limitations in our ability to both identify individuals at times of high risk and provide timely and specific interventions to mitigate that risk. With the increasing power of various tools of artificial intelligence (AI) and their application to a range of health another social problems, there is great interest in its potential to meet these challenges. To address the need for better identification of individuals at times of heightened suicide risk, a number of AI methods have been developed- these include several machine learning algorithms, timely contemporaneous analysis of individual social media posts and wearable devices, and efficient review of electronic health records. To provide specific intervention in a timely manner, real-time clinical alerts and provision of personalized supports along with virtual therapists (chatbots and virtual reality therapy) have been developed. In this presentation, the nature and current status of each of these methods will be reviewed and their potential for clinical use will be discussed. Ethical challenges and limitations of current AI approaches to suicide prevention will be summarized.
• Culturally Tailored Approaches to Suicide Prevention in Rural Communities – Cynthia Ewell-Foster, Clinical Professor, The University of Michigan and Sarah Derwin BA, Health Educator, Marquette County Health Department
  Across the US, age-adjusted suicide rates in rural counties are more than two times higher those in urban counties, with these disparities driven by firearm-related suicides. This session will explore unique considerations for the prevention of suicide in rural areas, including the critical role of community partnerships to ensure that messages are culturally tailored, acceptable to the community, and reflect the strengths and protective factors in rural areas. The session will share lessons learned from the implementation of a comprehensive public health approach to suicide in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula (UP). The importance of credible messengers in promoting firearm safety and lethal means counseling will be discussed, along with cultural factors that influence firearm ownership and storage practices in rural communities. Attendees will be introduced to Store Safely, a new multi-component online primary prevention strategy currently being implemented and evaluated in Michigan’s UP.
• Preparing the Pathway to Healing for the Bereaved and the Professional – Gwen Kopcia, CT, LBSW, Owner, Your Grief Guide
  With the pain and suffering surrounding suicide loss, we want to be sure we are preparing a pathway for healing. Many times, we feel uncertain on what to say or do when being present to the hurting survivors.  It is critical that our responses are helpful and not hurtful.  This workshop will look closer into what the bereaved person needs, provide techniques for the worker to assure we are not revictimizing the hurting, and that we remain healthy in this process.
• Integrating Zero Suicide in Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinics (CCBHCs) – Laurin Jozlin,LMSW, Senior Project Associate, EDC
  This presentation explores practical strategies for implementing the Zero Suicide framework within Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinics (CCBHCs) to create a comprehensive, system-wide approach to improving suicide care. Participants will learn how CCBHCs can embed evidence-based practices, strengthen leadership commitment, and develop coordinated suicide care pathways that ensure no one falls through the cracks. Through examples and implementation lessons, the session highlights tools, training, and metrics that drive sustainable change—empowering outpatient settings to move from crisis response to proactive prevention and continuous improvement.
• Lethal Means Safety Counseling for Community Members – Jeremy Suttles, LMSW, MSE, Community Engagement and Partnership Coordinator, Veterans Administration Ann Arbor Healthcare System
  This workshop will introduce Lethal Means Safety as an intervention to help reduce overdose and suicide deaths.  Participants will learn what lethal means are, the connection between lethal means and risk of harm, and tips for engaging in conversations around lethal means safety.  Specific attention is given to the importance of understanding culture and values as part of the counseling and planning process.  Additional resources will be shared as well.
• Applying Dynamical Systems Approaches to Identify Short-Term Risk for Suicidal Behavior –Melanie Bozzay, PhD, Suicide Prevention Director, Assistant Professor, The Ohio State University Department of Psychiatry, Affiliated Assistant Professor (Research), Brown University
  
  Suicide is a significant public health problem. Currently, there are no clinical strategies available to identify who will engage in suicidal behavior and when, hindering efforts to deliver targeted, timely interventions to prevent suicides. In recent decades, computationally intensive models have been developed to forecast which patients are at risk of suicidal behavior, months to years in advance. Despite these advances, existing risk monitoring systems do not reduce suicidal behavior or identify clinically actionable time periods of risk. This talk will describe the current state of suicide risk prediction science and ethical considerations of prediction approaches. It will then describe a novel strategy towards predicting suicidal behavior days in advance informed by dynamical systems theory, currently in development in the Analysis to Reveal Trajectories and Early Markers of Imminent Shifts in Suicidal States (ARTEMIS) Study.

3:30-3:45pm BREAK

3:34-4:45pm KEYNOTE 4: Discussion of the Progress in Suicide Research and Prevention: What’s on the Horizon – Thomas Joiner, PhD, Professor, Florida State University
This session aims to provide an in-depth exploration of the evolving landscape of suicide research, focusing on three critical areas: the future directions of research in suicide risk prediction, the progression from suicidal ideation to action, and the psychological pain associated with suicidal crises. By connecting these three vital areas, this session will not only highlight the critical gaps in current research but also inspire collaborative efforts towards developing effective prevention strategies. Participants will leave with a renewed understanding of the complexities of suicide risk and actionable insights to inform their work in this essential field. This presentation promises to be a thought-provoking and informative session, encouraging active engagement and dialogue among researchers, clinicians, and advocates committed to reducing suicide rates and improving mental health outcomes.

Day 1 Event Schedule
2026 Youth Mental Health & School Summit

Who’s Invited

Participants in the 10th Annual Kevin’s Song Suicide Prevention Education Summit will gather in-person from all around the State of Michigan – from Metro Detroit to Marquette and from Grand Rapids to Bay City.

Participants Will Include:

• Educators / Teachers
• Parents / Family Members
• Psychologists /Social Workers / Licensed Counselors
• Physicians / Nurses / Medical Professionals
• Crisis Center Workers
• First Responders / Law Enforcement and Firefighters
• Policymakers
• Loss Survivors
• Employers/Human Resource Professionals
• Veterans and Veteran Support Groups
• People with Lived Experience
• Members of the General Public
• Professional Trainees and Students
  

2026 Speakers and Presenters

2026 Sponsorship Kit

Registration Information: