Hussain Manawer has set a new Guinness world record for the world\u2019s largest mental health lesson. Backed by the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and Prince Harry, he organised the event in conjunction with Dame Til Wykes, Professor of Clinical Psychology and Rehabilitation at King\u2019s College London and Director of the NIHR Clinical Research Network.<\/p>\n
Over 500 school children from across the UK aged between 13 and 18 took part in the 30-minute lesson at the Hackney Empire. The interactive session was designed to encourage debate and conversation around the difficult topic of mental illness, and covered issues such as depression, stigma, where to get help and how to maintain good mental health.<\/p>\n
Hussain graduated in 2012 from the Quantity Surveying BSc course. He has gone on to become an advocate for greater awareness around mental health issues through his YouTube channel Hussain\u2019s House. In 2016, he won the Krugar Cowne Rising Star competition for his passionate campaigning as well addressing misconceptions of Islam and what it is to be a Muslim. In 2018, he will become the first British Muslim in space<\/a>.<\/p>\n Speaking to the audience, Hussain said: \u201cIf you\u2019re going through something you need to speak to someone about it, but if you don\u2019t feel comfortable talking to your friends then maybe you need to evaluate who your friends are.\u201d<\/p>\n At the event, Hussain also performed his poem \u2018I\u2019m ashamed\u2019, which will be released on his forthcoming EP \u2018Am I going too deep?\u2019 during Mental Health Awareness Week from the 8-14 May 2017.<\/p>\n 4Music presenter Maya James hosted the event and other celebrities, including Rizzle Kicks\u2019 rapper Jordan Stephen, YouTuber Humza Arshad, singer Sin\u00e9ad Harnett and actors from BBC\u2019s Eastenders also performed. Video pledges from Gary Linekar, Piers Morgan, Holly Willoughby, Philip Schofield, Matthew Wright and Susanna Reid were also screened.<\/p>\n Hussain told us: \u201cI organised the world\u2019s largest mental health lesson, because the taboo of a subject exists due to our lack of knowledge about it. The lesson was education mixed with entertainment \u2013 it\u2019s something I’ve always wanted to do and keeping it in East London is something I’m as equally passionate about.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Hussain Manawer has set a new Guinness world record for the world\u2019s largest mental health lesson. Backed by the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and Prince Harry, he organised the event in conjunction with Dame Til Wykes, Professor of Clinical…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":239,"featured_media":578,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-576","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/576","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/239"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=576"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/576\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/578"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=576"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=576"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.westminster.ac.uk\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=576"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}