“I was hesitant to go to Ben’s house too,” Adelaide says. “My friend invited me ... I went every day and started hanging out with these guys.” Ben, Adelaide, Weston, Dalton, and Aidan all felt like they needed to do something for their fellow students, and for their school. And in the following months, Moving Forward went from just a dream to reality. “We wanted to get off the past and make Gilbert better for the future,” Ben says. “All of us loved Nolan and that’s why we’ve worked so hard because we miss our buddy and we don’t want anyone to go through that pain again.” A group meeting in December led to another in January and another in February. Through- out this period, as they developed a strategy and goals for their group, they were adamant about one thing — it had to be student driven. It was a big ask of Gilbert Schools to let them grab the wheel and drive on such an important topic as teen mental health awareness, and yet the resolve in the group’s words and actions earned the trust of school administrators. “I really understood why they felt the need
Moving Forward member Jack Hack- ett speaks at the Sep- tember school as- sembly.
to take it into their own hands,” Gilbert High School Principal Cindy Bassett says. “Because who are the strongest influencers on teen- agers? It’s teenagers. We do everything we can
as parents and educators, but we know during this time of their lives that our voice is just a murmur. We’re there and we’re trying as hard as we can, but we’re just kind of a dull
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