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Good practice Imported

The Trevor Project — Digital Crisis Services for LGBTQ+ Youth

United States of America · West Hollywood · See the United States of America profile

Evidence: Observational / pre–post Top 9% 96/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

US nonprofit runs 24/7 phone, text and chat crisis lines for LGBTQ+ youth; over 450,000 contacts in FY2024. In 2025 it lost a $26M federal 988 contract, cutting 12% of staff — a real sustainability test.

450,000+
Crisis calls, chats and texts handled (FY2024 (Aug 2023-Jul 2024))
700 %
Surge in crisis contacts after the November 2024 US election
33 %
Increase in crisis contacts around the January 2025 inauguration
~20,000
TrevorSpace members analysed for social-integration/depression study
26 million USD
Federal 988 contract terminated (June 2025)
12 %
Staff reduction following funding loss

Details

Maturity
Established
Promoter
The Trevor Project
Period
1998-present
Keywords
LGBTQ+ youth, mental health, suicide prevention, digital crisis intervention, telehealth

Context

Founded in 1998 after the murder of Matthew Shepard, The Trevor Project runs the only national 24/7 crisis-intervention and suicide-prevention service focused on LGBTQ+ young people aged 13-24, via phone, text and web chat, plus the moderated peer-support network TrevorSpace.

Activities

In FY2024 its Crisis Intervention team handled more than 450,000 calls, chats and texts, with volume spiking sharply around political events — a roughly 700% surge the day after the November 2024 election and a 33% increase around the January 2025 inauguration.

Results

A peer-reviewed academic study (Homan et al. 2014, ACM CSCW) analysed the social graph of about 20,000 TrevorSpace members and found that youth more deeply integrated into the platform's social structure reported lower depression scores (PHQ-9), one of the few peer-reviewed evaluations of an LGBTQ+-specific digital peer-support platform.

Conclusions

The service's funding proved fragile: after citing a funding "perfect storm" in January 2025, the organisation lost a $26 million federal 988 contract in June 2025 and cut 12% of staff, showing that even a heavily used, evidence-linked digital service can face abrupt sustainability risk from a single funding decision.

Implementation

Implementation detail (cost, timeline, staffing, conditions for success) is not yet available for this practice.

Commonly funded by

Philanthropic / foundation funding

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Data sources

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