Prosper
PROSPER

For Dr. Kent Corso, suicide prevention isn't just a mental health initiative. It is a societal imperative. A US Air Force veteran, licensed clinical psychologist, suicidologist, and board-certified behavior analyst, Dr. Corso witnessed early in his military career that more service members were dying by suicide than by enemy fire.

That grim reality never left him. Today, as the founder of PROSPER Together, a small, veteran-owned company founded in 2010, he's transforming how communities address the complex, often misunderstood issue of suicide. He achieves that by focusing on building sustainable, evidence-based systems of support that reduce long-term risk, instead of just awareness campaigns that offer passive solutions.

"Suicide is as pervasive and complicated as poverty, homelessness, or crime," Dr. Corso explains. "We've spent too long relying on reactive models that don't equip communities with the tools they need to support each other."

Founded on the principles of Proactive Reduction of Suicides in Populations via Evidence-based Research, PROSPER Together works at the intersection of science, lived experience, and community resilience. The organization partners with health care providers, schools, businesses, faith-based institutions, law enforcement, and legislators to empower everyday people to intervene when someone is in distress. Their aim is long-term cultural change, one that replaces silence with action and fear-based reactions with trust-building.

Dr. Corso points out a startling gap: it takes an average of 17 years for clinical research to reach frontline medical workers. For suicide prevention research, that delay is closer to 30 years. "That lag can cost lives," he says. "We work to close that gap by translating cutting-edge research into training that's practical, understandable, and usable in the field."

PROSPER's reach spans diverse domains, right from primary care, emergency medicine, K-12 education, public safety, to workforce development, and even legislative reform. The training itself focuses on three phases: prevention, intervention, and postvention.

The organization works extensively with first responders, such as firefighters, EMS, and police, who are often the first ones called when someone expresses suicidal thoughts. Yet, as Dr. Corso notes, regulations are highly outdated.

"They're trained to assess danger, but instead, the system reduces them to just being drivers," he says. "They transport people to emergency rooms where, after up to 16 hours of waiting and 72 hours of monitoring, individuals are released back into the same conditions that drove them to crisis in the first place." The outcome is tragically predictable: roughly 1 in 4 people who are released from inpatient care after a suicide attempt will take their life within the following week.

PROSPER's model rejects one-size-fits-all solutions. Instead, it brings together stakeholders from every facet of each community, may it be parents, teachers, sheriffs, pastors, HR departments, or policy makers. Dr. Corso also explains how supervisors and managers are uniquely poised to spot and help suicidal employees.

But he says the goal isn't to be the permanent solution but to build communities that can help themselves. He does so by co-creating culturally tailored strategies that foster connectedness and encourage self-help and helping others. He further explains, "If a school, church, or police department relies on us forever, we've failed. We're here to make systems sustainable."

That ethos of empowerment is driving the company's next major milestone: the September launch of a comprehensive online learning platform. The goal is simple: equip communities, everywhere. By offering asynchronous training, PROSPER hopes to scale its impact without compromising quality. "We want a broader reach. We want people in rural areas, cold mountain states, and underserved regions to get the same tools as someone in a city hospital," Dr. Corso says.

PROSPER is also making waves in legislation. In partnership with the Governor of Wyoming, a state that has ranked among the highest in suicide rates for the past decade, PROSPER helped influence a key change through conversations: the state now recognizes mental health crises, including suicide, as emergency situations under its Good Samaritan laws. Prior to that, only Missouri included mental health under those protections.

"We know that communities are the most sustainable solution," says Dr. Corso. "If laws don't encourage and authorise people to help one another, they may hesitate."

On May 22, PROSPER will host a community call to action in Lincoln County, featuring the Governor, local elected officials, and residents with lived experience. The event underscores PROSPER's mission: elevate voices, destigmatize, and reduce risk, not just in September's Suicide Prevention Month, but every day of the year.

Dr. Corso's podcasts feature survivors and those who've lost loved ones to suicide, giving real faces and voices to the statistics. "They're the experts," he says. "Who better to guide us than those who've lived through it?"

As PROSPER grows, its core values remain unchanged: sustainability, empowerment, and connection. Suicide prevention is everyone's responsibility, Dr. Corso insists, but it starts by shifting how one talks about it. "We can't reduce suicide risk if we treat it like a shadow problem. People are afraid to ask for help because they think it means being dragged to a hospital or losing their job," he says. "We need to teach people to help themselves."

In a world where silence has too often meant loss, PROSPER Together is ensuring the next conversation is one of hope.