The “Out of the Darkness: A Community Walk to Prevent Suicide” on Oct. 4 had personal meaning for Damion Cummins.

Cummins is the director of the Community Counseling Clinic and assistant professor of counseling at Cummins coordinated the walk sponsored by the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.

“I was truly surprised and grateful at how many people who came out and supported and enjoyed and want to do it again,” Cummins said.

Cummins lost his uncle to suicide three years ago.

“It was a devastating thing for our family to have to deal with and so it’s a big reason for me to know that I want to help others so that they don’t have to suffer,” Cummins said. 

Cummins’ friend helped run a support group, Heart Beat Monroe, for people who have lost loved ones to suicide, and the group’s leader passed the event to Cummins to lead. Though September is Suicide Awareness Month, the event was planned for October due to the short notice and to avoid summer heat.

The walk began at 9 a.m. at Bayou Park and headed east toward the football stadium and circled around the area with the tennis courts.

Cummins noticed the campus lacked wheelchair accessibility in certain locations as he planned the walk. He has used a wheelchair since his spinal cord injury from a football accident in September 1992.

 “I think I’ve come a long way to be a professor, to be independent, to live on my own, to drive and everything else. I think I’ve overcome a lot of these obstacles and barriers that I’ve had in my life,” he said.

Cummins has been both a student and a professor at ULM. He has seen campus improvements in wheelchair accessibility since he was a freshman psychology student in 1997.  

“From the time that I have been here as a student, there have been major strides and progress and catering to and helping individuals with disabilities as far as accessibility and all,” Cummins said.

However, Cummins discovered that the east side of campus is still inaccessible to those in wheelchairs in certain areas after he completed a pre-walk in preparation of the event. 

Cummins said education and awareness along with simple adjustments such as curb cuts or ramps would help individuals on campus with disabilities.

Joshua Morgan, a counseling graduate student, said “The main purpose was to promote suicide awareness. This is an issue that is preventable.

Health vendors set up and featured mental health programs. 

Nirali Patel, a sophomore secondary education major, volunteered to help set up. His sister’s classmate committed suicide in eighth grade.

“If people had noticed or he’d gotten help, he’d still be here and would be a junior in high school,” Patel said.

Future events include a nursing home project and a workshop at Ouachita Parish Library to educate the public on mental illnesses.