Shirin Mehrpooya is a third-year Medical Sciences student at Dalhousie University and a mental health champion. Shirin combines her own experience living with mental illness and the lived experiences of others to fuel her passion for mental health promotion and advocacy.
Shirin Mehrpooya, 2021 Let's Keep Talking Award Recipient for Outstanding Youth.
“It is really admirable to see how Shirin has taken her own experiences with mental illness to help further the experiences of other youth like herself,” says Roshanak Sadeghi-Zadeh, who nominated Shirin for the award. “She believes her work is never done as there is always room to make our mental health care system more accessible and she uses lived experiences to lead this change.”
Shirin is the founder of AMPLIFY NS, a grassroots youth-led organization that empowers youth from all walks of life to safely and freely share their needs and concerns with local mental healthcare providers and stakeholders. Through this passion project, Shirin has provided free mental health workshops to youth throughout Nova Scotia and is planning a province-wide roundtable event with local decision-makers to advocate for adaptations to Nova Scotia’s mental healthcare system.
“The passion and perseverance of Shirin Mehrpooya is inspiring,” says Mental Health Foundation of Nova Scotia President & CEO Starr Cunningham. “Her contributions to the mental health community are astounding and we can’t wait to see where her healthcare career takes her. There’s no doubt, she will have a profound impact on the mental health of Nova Scotians.”
A graduate of Charles P. Allen High School, Shirin helped launch the school’s first mental health week as the co-president of its Jack.org Chapter. Committed to creating a safe space for her peers to talk about mental health, she continued to promote peer wellness upon her arrival at Dalhousie University. She has served on the Dalhousie Student Union Mental Health Bursary Committee and was the first mental health rep for the Medical Sciences Society of Dalhousie University; a position she helped create. Shirin has acted as an advisor on mental health promotion campaigns about harm reduction for students living on campus. Shirin currently serves on the National Youth Advisory Council for the Mood Disorders Society of Canada and is helping plan the council’s wellness podcast set to launch this year.
“Thinking back to my first mental health crisis in grade 10, I would have never imagined that sharing my story would have helped those around me,” says Shirin. “Receiving this recognition affirms that I am on the right path and that my work is improving my community. This recognition only further ignites my passion and motivation to keep advocating for equitable mental healthcare.”
Shirin hopes to see the day language, financial and cultural barriers cease to perpetuate the double stigma that prevents underrepresented youth from accessing the care they deserve. Shirin lives and breathes mental health promotion and hopes to pursue psychiatry, treating vulnerable populations in rural Nova Scotia.
Congratulations, Shirin Mehrpooya, our 2021 Let's Keep Talking Award Recipient for Outstanding Youth. (Sponsored by IWK Mental Health & Addiction Program)