Founded in 1987, Kids Under Twenty One strives to be a lead agency in utilizing youth and adult partner volunteers in providing peer facilitated crisis prevention, suicide intervention and postvention support to youth in the St. Louis metropolitan area. KUTO trains youth with the skills, confidence and courage to help a friend or peer by implementing the “teens helping teens help themselves” philosophy.

Our best-known program, the KUTO Crisis Helpline, has helped thousands of teen callers identify and develop solutions for their problems. Trained youth Crisis Workers assist callers in working through feelings of anxiety, loneliness, depression or thoughts of suicide and develop action plans to manage stress, mediate conflict and overcome despair. Nearly one in ten callers report that a friend referred them to the KUTO Crisis Helpline.

KUTO works to creatively develop opportunities in which trained youth volunteers can empower and assist others in helping themselves and their peers. Our unique Peer Helper Team facilitates a structured program of peer helper skill building exercises and empowerment activities. Since the fall of 1992, KUTO Peer Helper teams have worked in public, private and parochial schools throughout the greater St. Louis metro area.

CRISIS HOTLINE: 1-888-644-5886