LULIO
Wellbeing games to prevent the loss of bright futures due to depression, bullying, and suicide.
Website : http://www.lul.io/
Who are we?
We are Jamie Chiu and Mark Altosaar, two passionate people fighting for what we believe in. We started LULIO in February 2015 because we believe that every teen deserves to like themselves and be happy with who they are. Our mission is to prevent the loss of bright futures due to depression, bullying, and suicide.
We do this by creating mobile games for secondary school students to improve their emotional awareness, build resiliency, and foster compassion for themselves and other people. We package our mobile games together with resources for teachers to create a school-based student mental wellbeing program.
How did LULIO come about?
I (Jamie) was completing my doctorate in clinical psychology on adolescent emotion and the effects of group counselling. Through my research and my work as a school counsellor, I saw many teens struggle with self esteem. I saw a lot of loneliness and teens not liking themselves.
To tackle this, I created an in-school program for small groups of teens. I’ve run it with many schools, and the results were great. It was proven to reduce depression and improve self-esteem, but it was limited in scale. After meeting Mark, who has a background in technology, together we came up with the idea of translating elements of my proven program and research into a digital game that could help so many more students.
What products do we offer?
Our first product is LULIO Game=Strong, a series of mini-games designed for teens to learn about their personal strengths and build awareness of their overall wellbeing.
Our second flagship product is LULIO Antipodes, a multiplayer role playing game for teens to build up positive strengths. There are specific modules and learning outcomes presented through game levels, missions and challenges.
We believe that by building up a young person’s emotional awareness, self esteem, resilience, and compassion, they will come out psychologically stronger and better prepared to cope with the challenges of school, relationships and society.
What keeps our team together?
Learning and not being afraid of failing. It's also important that we can talk about everything without fear of being judged. If we want to help young people build resilience and compassion, and be happy with who they are, then we need to stay on that path as well.
Our philosophy is: “If not you then who. If not now then when.”
Who are we looking for?
We want to find all the people who believe in what we believe, that every teen deserves to like themselves and be happy with who they are.
We would love if you could contribute in any way, even if it is just to drop us an email and tell us some words of encouragement!
For more info, you can see our sign up link here: http://www.lul.io/trial
Important notes
We will never sell any personal details and we will delete all identifying information once the study is over.
Another point is that even though families may participate, we do not share information between parents and children - we respect confidentiality and privacy on both sides.
However, if there is any risk of suicide or self-harm identified in a teen, we will immediately notify a parent/guardian and discuss next steps together.
We also have an FAQ for teens and parents. You can view it here: http://www.lul.io/faq
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