Dr. Shamender Talwar, who Assisted Families After Last Week’s Shooting, Will Address Mental Health Issues Affecting College Campuses 

Dr. Shamender Talwar, a crisis and social psychologist and co-founder of the international organization The Unity of Faiths Foundation (TUFF), will speak to MTSU faculty, staff and students on Thursday, April 6, at 10 a.m. to answer their questions about mental health following the mass shooting in Nashville.

The event will be held in the KUC theater and is free and open to the public.  

He will be joined by Pamela L. Lewis, president of PLA Media, Mark Logsdon, a graduate of MTSU and vice president of PLA Media, Daniel Xander, a trustee and creative director of TUFF, and Anna Prior, co-founder of TUFF.

“The moment I heard that Dr. Talwar was in Middle Tennessee, I asked Pam and Mark if he would be available to speak to the MTSU community,” says Beverly Keel, deal of the College of Media and Entertainment. “So many of us have a great deal of fear and anxiety following the news of last week’s mass shooting, and I know that he would be able to tell us everything we should know.”

Dr. Talwar is from Liverpool, England and now lives in London. He was named the British Indian of the Year and inducted into the Royal Society of Arts (joining Nelson Mandela, Stephen Hawking, and others) for his ground-breaking work with TUFF, which has helped English youth resist Islamic radicalization and street gangs by encouraging them to play soccer together. He has been named a visionary by the Pope, President Obama, and the European Union Parliament. It was this work that brought him to Nashville and led to a partnership with Pam Lewis, one of the top public relations leaders in Nashville.

Lewis introduced Keel to Dr. Talwar last year when the two were working on a songwriting contest called The Road to Nashville, a global music project that promoted mental health. After meeting with Dr. Talwar at Lewis’ office, Keel agreed to have MTSU join the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts, the Metro Nashville City Council, BBC, BMI and other organizations to support this program. One of the program’s goals was to allow TUFF Earth to locate student musicians and songwriters in need of mental health and make them aware of the opportunity presented by the contest.  

Recently, Dr. Talwar has been spending time in Middle Tennessee to promote other mental health initiatives.  When news spread of last week’s shooting, Lewis, a TUFF Ambassador, immediately contacted him because she knew he would be invaluable as a resource on-site.  Accompanied by Lewis, he swiftly joined the team on-site at the Covenant School in Nashville to assist with counseling and support for the families and staff after the shooting that claimed six lives.

At the reunification center, Dr. Talwar joined police chaplains, Vice Mayor Jim Schulman, Metro Council Member At-Large Sharon Hurt, first responders, staff, and families of the students at the school to ensure that they had a sense of humanity as they traverse through the loss and grief associated with this tragedy. 

"I was led there to offer my services and serve in counsel to these families to mentor, speak and offer a hand of support,” he says.  “I could see the fear and anger in their eyes.”

Dr. Talwar added, “Mental health is the new pandemic."