Good mental health is essential for a community to thrive. Young Batswana face many challenges, such as high unemployment rates, high rates of gender based violence and limited access to mental health resources. Operating in the heart of the Gaborone West community, Mebala Youth Studios promotes Mental Health and Sports as ways to support the community and help individuals to build resilience, discipline and healthy coping strategies.
Our Counselling Department is determined to raise mental health awareness within the Gaborone West and surrounding communities by offering free counselling services, which can be in-person, on the phone (tele-counselling) or online. We also conduct group therapy sessions and tailored, topic-led workshops that are aimed at targeting larger groups in our community.
In the last year, we have helped over 300 people and logged over 1000 hours of one-on-one counselling. One third of these sessions took place online or through tele-counselling to accommodate those who require services but have a distance barrier.
Other Work
Through our strong collaborations, we have conducted several workshops on various topics such as Gender Norms and Their Effects on Mental Health, Men’s Mental Health, Mental Health in the Work Place, and Self Love. We have seen over 200 people participate in our interactive workshops.
Working with the Botswana Society for Human Development, we joined workshops in Gweta, Maun and Molepolole, where we were able to lead discussions on how to deal with drought in Botswana’s most climate affected areas, where people regularly lose their lives and livelihoods to flooding and animal migration.
We have also partnered with other organizations and movements to participate in Wellness Workshops, where some of our beneficiaries participated and got active. One such event was planned for the 2023 International Wellness Day, titled Positive You and hosted by Chedza Consultants.
NETWORKING SESSIONS
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