The STANDUP Act: School Requirements, Funding, and Sponsors

The STANDUP Act — the Suicide Training and Awareness Nationally Delivered for Universal Prevention Act of 2021 — is a federal law that steers Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) grant money toward schools that train students in grades six through twelve to recognize and respond to warning signs of suicide. President Biden signed it on March 15, 2022, and it took effect as Public Law 117-100, amending the Public Health Service Act.¹²

The law does not create a new grant program. It attaches strings to an existing one — Project AWARE, SAMHSA’s school-based mental health services grant — by giving priority to applicants that have adopted, or committed to adopt, a school-based suicide awareness and prevention training policy.²

What Schools Have to Do

State, local, and tribal educational agencies that receive Project AWARE funding must put in place a training policy for students in grades six through twelve. The policy must be evidence-based, as that term is defined in the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, culturally and linguistically appropriate, and coordinated with the school’s existing mental health resources.²

The training itself has to cover three things: suicide prevention education and awareness, including risk factors; ways for students to seek help for themselves or for peers; and information about the student resources available for suicide awareness and prevention. Periodic retraining is required, so it cannot be a single session.²

Before adopting a policy, agencies must consult with principals, teachers, parents, local tribal officials, and subject-matter experts. They are also encouraged to draw on the Suicide Prevention Technical Assistance Center authorized under the Public Health Service Act.²

How the Funding Leverage Works

The STANDUP Act is not a nationwide mandate. It does not override state laws, and it does not force any school to train students. What it does is make training a priority factor in Project AWARE grant decisions. Agencies that want a competitive edge for those awards must show they meet the policy requirements.²

State law may still require something separate. As of 2022, twenty-five states required schools to have suicide prevention policies, and twenty specifically mandated some form of student education on suicide and mental health.³

Data Reporting and Federal Oversight

Agencies operating under a training policy must collect and report aggregated data to the Secretary of Health and Human Services. That reporting covers the number of trainings conducted and the delivery methods used, the number of students trained (by age and grade), and the number of help-seeking reports students made after the policy took effect.²

The Secretary was directed to deliver a summary report to the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions and the House Committee on Energy and Commerce by September 30, 2024, documenting how many funded agencies had implemented policies and what the data showed.²

Which Programs Qualify

The law does not name a curriculum. Schools choose programs that meet the evidence-based standard. A 2023 rapid review in Archives of Suicide Research identified 12 school-based programs that satisfy the STANDUP Act’s criteria, drawn from 29 studies, and found that two of them met a high level of evidence for reducing suicidal thoughts and behaviors. Help-seeking was the most commonly measured outcome across the programs reviewed.⁴

Programs widely used in U.S. schools include Signs of Suicide (SOS), Sources of Strength, Headstrong, teen Mental Health First Aid, and Youth Aware of Mental Health.³ SOS, for instance, teaches a three-step response — Acknowledge, Care, Tell — for when students notice signs of depression or suicidal thinking in themselves or a peer, and it pairs the lesson with a validated screening tool that flags students who need further evaluation.⁵

Sponsors and Advocacy

The bill had bipartisan lead sponsors in both chambers: Senators Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire and Joni Ernst of Iowa, and Representatives Scott Peters of California and Gus Bilirakis of Florida.⁶⁷⁸ Supporters pointed to suicide as the second-leading cause of death among Americans ages ten to twenty-four, and to research indicating that roughly seventy percent of people who die by suicide communicate their plans or show warning signs beforehand.⁹¹⁰

1
U.S. Government Publishing Office. STANDUP Act of 2021, Public Law 117-100
2
Congress.gov. Public Law 117-100 Full Text
3
Taylor & Francis Online. Evidence Synthesis of Student-Directed Suicide Prevention Programs
4
PubMed. Rapid Review of School-Based Suicide Prevention Programs Under the STANDUP Act
5
Suicide Prevention Resource Center. SOS Signs of Suicide Prevention Programs
6
Office of Senator Maggie Hassan. Senators Hassan and Ernst’s Bipartisan Bill To Prevent Youth Suicide Signed Into Law
7
Sandy Hook Promise. Sandy Hook Promise Applauds Bipartisan Introduction of the STANDUP Act in the U.S. Senate
8
NABITA. NABITA Legislative Policy Corner: STAND-UP Act and BIG Act
9
Sandy Hook Promise. Sandy Hook Promise Applauds Bipartisan Reintroduction of the STANDUP Act
10
Office of Congressman Scott Peters. Rep. Peters STANDUP Act To Prevent Youth Suicide Becomes Law