Suicide Prevention Services of America (SPSA)

Our mission is to open minds, save lives and restore hope through prevention, intervention and postvention, using education, advocacy and collaboration.

Hotline Training takes place four times a year. Our volunteer phone operators complete 80 hours of training before taking a call alone. Volunteers commit to one full year and work one shift per week, and one additional shift per month, during the term of the one year commitment. 

Training To The Public: We also offer training to the public. It's called ASIST. ASIST is the world’s leading suicide intervention workshop. During the 2-day interactive session, participants learn to intervene and help prevent the immediate risk of suicide. It takes place 4 times a year at locations in the area to be determined. Any interested group can also request an ASIST workshop for their organization

Public Speaking: We are available to talk to large groups, schools, churches, colleges, police and fire departments, and hospitals as requested. We will travel as requested. Please contact us for details. 

Counseling: We can counseling anyone at SPS. Counseling is offered by insurance or sliding scale. 

Depression Screening: We offer depression screening to the public. If you feel you are depressed or know someone who is, we can give you an honest evaluation and make recommendations for treatment.

Hotline for crisis calls: We answer calls 24 hours a day. 800-273-8255 (The national suicide hotline number) is one of our numbers. 40% of the calls to this number are answered by our volunteers & staff. We also have a secondary number, exclusively ours locally: 630-482-9696. Should you or anyone you know need us in a crisis, simply call. 

Support groups: We offer 2 support groups a month. One is the first monday of the month in Sandwich, IL.  The second is in Aurora on the third monday of the month. Details and location can be found on our website: www.spsamerica.org  

Social Media: We maintain a Facebook page of more than 6,700 friends and a Twitter account with more than 830 followers. We also have a Youtube channel to house all of our event videos. 

www.facebook.com/suicidepreventionservices 

www.twitter.com/spsamerica           

www.youtube.com/spsfvillinois

SPS was founded on May 29, 1998. We are a 501 (3) (c) non-profit. 

We operate solely on donations and grants. Our mission is to open minds, save lives and restore hope through prevention, intervention and postvention, using education, advocacy and collaboration.

Suicide Prevention Services is located in Batavia, IL. at Stone Manor. 

528 S. Batavia Ave.
Batavia, Illinois  60510

We have a paid staff of five, all with Master Degrees or higher, and about 20 volunteers and 6 interns. We also have a Board of Directors who volunteer to meet once a month and review our work. 

SPS hosts about 6 fundraisers annually (including 50 Men Who Cook in March, Here for LIFE Walk in September, Harvest of HOPE Brunch in November, SANTAS for SPS in December) to raise funds and bring awareness. We function as a very lean, effective machine.

We are certified every five years by the American Association of Suicidology. We just completed our most recent certification in December 2014. 

Outreach in the schools: We have contracts with several schools in Kane and Kendall County for outreach to the children as well as being available in crisis control/prevention.