After more than a decade working one-on-one with individuals as a clinician, Jordyn Hagar realized she wanted to reach further—to reshape the systems and institutions that shape entire communities' mental health. That hunger for change led her to pursue a PhD in social work from Simmons University, a decision that would transform how thousands of people in the East Bay region recognize and support those struggling with their mental health.
Hagar's pivot from clinical work to systems-level thinking came gradually. During her husband's medical training, she pieced together part-time roles that allowed her to stay grounded while moving frequently with two young children. She taught social work at a liberal arts college, worked with a prevention coalition on mental health initiatives, and helped develop community programs. What drew her across all these roles was the chance to introduce evidence-based concepts to people who had never encountered them before—to bring psychology and social systems thinking into neighborhoods that needed it most.
When her family's location became permanent, Hagar realized something unexpected: she no longer wanted a full-time clinical job. "I wanted to do something more macro," she says. She pursued the online PhD program at Simmons specifically to strengthen her skills in large-scale intervention and to expand her options. Meeting Professor Michelle Putnam sealed her decision. Everything the program offered aligned with her instinct that bigger change was possible through education, policy, and community systems.
That vision crystallized into Stronger Together Mental Health Awareness Training, which emerged during her doctoral studies through work with the East Bay Regional Coalition, an organization focused on substance use prevention and mental health promotion. The problem Hagar identified was clear: community members recognized their neighbors were struggling but didn't know how to help. The existing mental health training programs were too demanding—they required significant time and money commitments that prevented people from attending or facilitating them.
Hagar conducted a targeted needs assessment to understand who would actually use a program and how they would use it. Then she rebuilt it from the ground up. The result was a program that could fit into the rhythms of real life. "It's a couple of hours, doesn't take a huge time commitment, and is offered at no cost," Hagar explains. The training can be delivered over two lunch sessions or brought directly into workplaces, making it flexible and portable—a critical feature that transformed it from a well-intentioned initiative into something communities could actually adopt.
The program's core focus remains elegant: helping people understand what mental health is, recognize when it shifts, and initiate a conversation with someone they're concerned about. It equips people with concrete skills for reaching out, not to diagnose or categorize disorders, but to notice change and connect people with resources they need.
Her PhD opened new doors for scaling this work. Hagar now has access to research funding to formalize and adapt the program, train facilitators across different states, and house all training materials in a unified digital platform. What began as one educator's frustration with cumbersome programs has become a replicable model, spreading across regions precisely because it respects the constraints of real life while addressing an urgent community need.