NEWS

The YumaKids Foundation presents the 2026 Calendar, whose launch marks the beginning of an annual awareness campaign dedicated to highlighting the various mental-health challenges affecting children and adolescents in Tolima. This educational and outreach campaign begins with the sale of the calendar, whose proceeds will help sustain our clinical, educational, and community programs.

Barcelona will host the 8th Catalan Congress of Mental Health, focused on art, culture, and creativity as tools to promote emotional well-being, mental health recovery, and community inclusion. The event highlights artistic creation processes —from visual and performing arts to literature and music— as a vehicle for expression, communication, and social transformation, generating spaces for socialization, inclusion, and collective empowerment.

Youth mental health in Colombia is in crisis - cases of anxiety, depression, and self-harm are rising fast. In the article we explore the scale of the problem, existing support initiatives, and the urgent need for more specialised mental health programs for young people.

Gift of Hope is an initiative born out of memory and generosity to transform pain into real opportunities. When someone close passes away, the desire arises to honor their memory through actions that benefit others. “At YumaKids we have received that impulse to strengthen the mental health of children and young people in vulnerable situations in Colombia,” says its current president.

The city of Bogotá and the beautiful sabanero town of Villapinzón experiencing theatrical experience

Elivey YudithMillán Enciso, a psychologist with extensive experience in the public education sector

YumaKids Foundation held drama workshops led by Oscar Orbezo i Comí, actor, screenwriter, and theater director, in 8 schools in the city of Ibagué (Colombia), 2 of which are located in rural areas.

YumaKids Foundation leads a documentary photography training in Ibagué (Colombia) led by renowned photojournalist and visual anthropologist Eva Parey, targeting teens seeking creative expression and emotional well-being.

YumaKids was invited to share its experience in preventing child sexual violence at a session organized by the Psychoanalytic Association of Buenos Aires (APdeBA), affiliated with the International Psychoanalytic Association.

Projecta’t and Yumakids offers an integrated view of how children's mental health can be contextualized and enriched through interdisciplinary practices that connect clinical work, education, and artistic creation.

YumaKids Foundation participated with the Master's program in Clinical Psychology at the Pontificia Universidad Javeriana, with the goal of presenting its intervention model aimed at minors who are victims of armed conflict in Colombia.

The European Congress of Multifamily Therapy is a highly significant event in the field of adolescent mental health, bringing together professionals from psychology, psychiatry, social work, education, and family support, as well as researchers and public policy makers.

In March 2025, we launched our Mental Health Workshops for Adolescents, Multifamily Workshops, and support programs for school counselors across several areas of Tolima.

On February 15, 2025, YumaKids was invited to present its work at the International Conference of the Latin American Psychoanalytic Federation (FEPAL), a major platform bringing together psychoanalytic, clinical, and educational professionals across the region.

YumaKids explores partnerships to strengthen mental health initiatives in Ibagué’s public schools.

YumaKids hosted a charity event in Bogotá to raise funds for its projects and to share with the Colombian public the progress and impact of its ongoing activities.

On August 18, 2023, over sixty students from Ibagué’s Technical School of Modelia voluntarily gathered—on what was expected to be a quiet, school-free day—to attend a powerful theatrical event by YumaKids: the play *Behind the Door*.

The YumaKids Foundation has seen its commitment to research and intervention in school mental health reflected in the Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychopathology and Mental Health, a biannual publication of the Orienta Foundation.

September is a key month to reflect on suicide prevention—a critical issue in Colombia. In Tolima alone, the health surveillance system (SIVIGILA) recorded 669 suicide attempts among children and adolescents in just one week in 2019, with particularly high rates among youth aged 15 to 24 and among females.

On Thursday, April 4, 2019, YumaKids held its first Solidarity Gathering of Music and Visual Arts in Barcelona to raise funds for its emotional and psychological support programs for at-risk adolescents. The event took place at the H10 Art Gallery Hotel at 7:00 p.m.

On December 20, 2018, YumaKids announced the addition of new international volunteers to enhance its psychological and emotional support programs for vulnerable adolescents. The diverse, multidisciplinary team reflects the international nature of the foundation and the global relevance of Colombia’s conflict.

In October 2017, YumaKids Foundation and Ágora Images (Barcelona) ran the 'Ágora' photography workshop in Ibagué, Tolima, bringing together students from five local schools to explore creativity and express their reality through imagery.

Resilience, understood as the ability of young people to overcome adversity, is widely recognized as a key factor for positive mental health. Recent studies show that high resilience is linked to lower rates of emotional problems in adolescents. The WHO estimates that 1 in 7 youths aged 10–19 suffers from a mental disorder.

In 2017, YumaKids Foundation celebrated its first anniversary and, thanks to the support of donors and collaborators, launched its first projects in Ibagué and surrounding municipalities in Tolima, Colombia—a region with high poverty, inequality, and school dropout rates.

On December 15, 2016, the iconic Palau Robert in Barcelona, Spain, hosted the founding event of the YumaKids Foundation in a gathering that combined solemnity and excitement for youth mental health. This neoclassical building, whose gardens reflect the city’s historical grandeur, has become a key space for cultural and social events.