Suicide prevention a focus of MWAH! presentation on September 8 at Cambridge High School
(Cambridge Chronicle and Kewanee Star Courier)
Posted September 5, 2014 by Mike Landis, editor of the Kewanee Star Courier
Some of the MWAH! troupe members during their dance finale on August 15 at
Mannheim Middle School for students from the western suburbs of Franklin
Park, Northlake, and Melrose Park.
(photo by Scott Harrington)
Twin seniors at Cambridge High School and a mom from Geneseo will participate with the MWAH! Performing Arts Troupe at Cambridge High School Monday (Sept. 8), in a special program on suicide awareness and prevention.
Mady and Jessie Smith will discuss the ambitious suicide awareness campaign they began following the death of their father, Scott Smith, a respected Cambridge attorney; and Jennifer Higgins will share the loss of her son, Joshua Wilson, a Geneseo seventh grader, after he had been bullied.
Also participating will be Joel Clousing, father of a 19–year–old who, after frequent trips to rehab and jail, died six months ago from a heroin overdose.
Included also will be an update about a huffing–related crash outside Kewanee nearly three years ago that killed three Stark County High School students, as well as implications for Cambridge and other western
Illinois communities from a couple of recent national and international incidents – the shooting last month by a white police officer of an unarmed black teenager in Ferguson, Missouri, and the beheadings within the past three weeks of two American journalists by the militant Islamic State (ISIS) crusade.
Joining Cambridge High School and junior high students for the assembly will be students from Alwood High School, which co–ops with Cambridge as the Ridgewood Spartans in athletics.
The 90–minute presentation will begin at 8:45 a.m. in the gym of the high school at 300 S. West St.
Participating with a MWAH! band (an acronym for Messages Which Are Hopeful!) will be a Cambridge High School choir ensemble in a song, "Nothing More," that was written in memory of one of the first grade victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting 21 months ago.
In the finale, the combined Cambridge and AWood cheerleaders (Ridgewood co–op) will join MWAH! performers in a choreographed dance production, having rehearsed together earlier on Monday.
The essence of the 13–member MWAH! ensemble is real life drama combined with contemporary music and audience interaction.
Current troupe members range in age from 8 to 17, and live throughout the western suburbs of Chicago as well as the Rockford area.
The presentation on Monday will be followed by a discussion session focusing on the issues presented and how they relate to such communities as Cambridge, Alpha, and Woodhull.
The not–for–profit troupe is a suburban and Downstate affiliate of the Chicago Area Project, a grassroots service and advocacy program, and part of an Illinois-wide community services network targeting at-risk youth and their families.
Coordinating the troupe's appearance in Cambridge have been Beth Smith and her teenaged daughters and Lisa Miller, Cambridge High School counselor and volleyball coach.
For more information about the MWAH! Performing Arts Troupe, visit their website at www.mwah.net.
Read more: Cambridge_News
For more information about the MWAH! Performing Arts Troupe, visit MWAH! .