Prince Harry and Meghan, Duke and Duchess of Sussex, were honored with Project Healthy Minds’ Humanitarians of the Year Award at the nonprofit’s third annual World Mental Health Day Gala in New York City.
The recognition celebrates their sustained commitment to building safer digital environments for children and families, alongside their broader contributions to global mental health support and their initiative, The Parents’ Network.
The Parents’ Network: From Grief to Global Movement
Their work began in 2020, tracking the effects of online harms and consulting with Stanford University experts who had identified troubling findings about social media’s impact on young people. After extensive research and meetings with families whose children’s lives were irrevocably affected, the Duke and Duchess introduced The Parents’ Network two years ago at Project Healthy Minds’ World Mental Health Day Festival—a fitting venue, they noted, for launching a community designed to expand mental health support access while prioritizing online safety for families and young people.
A Crisis of Scale
The scope of the challenge intensified dramatically since The Parents’ Network’s inception. According to the Social Media Victims Law Center, more than 4,000 families were pursuing legal action related to social media harms—a figure the Duke and Duchess emphasized represented only a fraction of affected families, limited to those with the resources and capacity to take legal action through a single law firm. “If these deaths and harm to children were ‘unintended consequences’ ten years ago,” Prince Harry said, “then what are they now?”
Recent research underscored the urgency. A study conducted by Parents Together found that researchers posing as children on AI chatbot platforms experienced harmful interactions every five minutes during 50 hours of observation. Meanwhile, most teenagers and approximately 10% of children aged 5 to 8 had used AI chatbots, yet only one in three parents of these young users were aware of their children’s engagement with the technology.
“These are parents who knew passcodes, who talked about devices and social media profiles,” they noted. “They were engaged and loving families, and it still came for them.”
Expanding the Mission
The network evolved from a support community for bereaved parents into an international organization spanning the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom.
At the gala, the Duke and Duchess announced that The Parents’ Network was joining forces with Parents Together, positioning the initiative for broader reach and deeper impact as technology continued its rapid evolution. The move represented what they described as “a natural evolution to enable the community to continue to grow and have more impact alongside the rapid rise of technology.”
The expansion built on the foundation laid by co-creators Lennon Flowers and Leora Wolf-Prusan, alongside community managers including Brandy and Toney Roberts, Kirsten Ryan, and Amy Neville, who facilitated healing spaces for affected families.
Supporting Project Healthy Minds’ Mission
The gala supported Project Healthy Minds’ ambitious goal to connect more than 10 million Americans with mental health services through its free digital marketplace over the next decade. Phillip Schermer, the nonprofit’s Founder and CEO, emphasized the alignment between this mission and the Duke and Duchess’s work.
“It is a privilege to honor Prince Harry and Meghan, Duke and Duchess of Sussex, at our World Mental Health Day Gala this year,” Schermer said. “Their leadership, generosity, and unwavering commitment to advancing mental health awareness have made a profound difference in the lives of so many.”
Prince Harry and Meghan co-founded The Archewell Foundation in 2020 with a straightforward mission: show up, do good. The Parents’ Network represented one manifestation of this commitment, addressing what the couple viewed as an intersection of child safety, mental health, and the responsibilities that came with technological advancement.
“We know that the challenges ahead are significant,” they said, “but we also know that when parents come together, when communities unite, real change is possible.”
Research
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Collective Action
Your brain on ChatGPT
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The Luddite Club
The Balance Project
The Parents’ Network
Smartphone Free Childhood
Jonathan Haidt sits down with Prince Harry on World Mental Health Day 2024