A Latina mental health activist will facilitate a dialogue at Ithaca College focusing on intersectionality as it relates to people of color in our communities. Dior Vargas will present “POC and Mental Health” on Wednesday, Sept. 28, at 7 p.m. in Textor 101. Her presentation is free and open to the public.
To help remove the stigma of mental illness in the Latino/a community, Vargas created the People of Color and Mental Illness Photo Project, a response to the invisibility of people of color in the media representation of mental illness.
She serves as a volunteer crisis counselor for CrisisTextLine and is a co-facilitator for the Young Adult Support Group at NAMI-NYC Metro, the National Alliance on Mental Illness of New York City, a grassroots organization that provides support, education and advocacy for families and individuals of all ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds who live with mental illness.
For her work, Vargas has been recognized as a White House Champion of Change for Disability Advocacy Across Generations, a Voices of the Year honoree under the Impact category at the #BlogHer15: Experts Among Us Conference and a Bill Compton LGBTQI Leadership Award winner.
Her presentation is being held as part of Latinx Heritage Month at Ithaca College. For more information, visit www.ithaca.edu/sacl/osema/multicultural.