Minnesota Aurora FC, WeAre8, NAMI partner for mental health initiative during 2025 season

Minnesota Aurora FC announced today a unique partnership with WeAre8 to encourage fans to protect their mental health through better social media consumption and promote the National Alliance on Mental Illness’ (NAMI) 988 Suicide & Crisis Hotline with NAMI Minnesota.

On May 11, when Aurora takes the field for their exhibition match, the players will wear one-of-a-kind co-branded NAMI – WeAre8 jerseys, and the club will begin their “Mindful Moment” platform to kick off the partnership for the 2025 season. KFAN’s Chris Hawkey, a leading advocate for Mental Health, will lead the first Mindful Moment on Sunday eight minutes before the game. Fans will be encouraged to put down their devices and connect with other fans through acts of kindness – high fives, hugs, or words of kindness.

The initiative coincides with National Mental Health Awareness Month. As part of Aurora’s efforts, the team will move away from X and toward WeAre8. A safe, positive social platform, WeAre8 leverages advanced AI moderation systems to eliminate toxic content and commentary. It does not use controlling algorithms to dictate what people see; instead, it enables people to reach and engage with their full community through every post. The platform is also underpinned by a transformational economic model that shares its ad-revenue back with the community.

For the 2025 season, players will wear warm up shirts during all games with 988 messaging on the front and WeAre8 on the back. At the end of the season, the club will auction off the signed warm up shirts with the proceeds from the auction going to NAMI. For each goal Aurora scores during the 2025 regular season WeAre8 pledges $100 to NAMI as part of the club’s Goals for Good campaign.

About NAMI

NAMI – the National Alliance on Mental Illness – the nation’s largest grassroots mental health organization dedicated to building better lives for millions of Americans affected by mental illness – and has chapters across all 50 states. The organization’s 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline is the nationwide, three-digit number for anyone to contact to be connected to the lifeline and is available via, call text or chat (988Lifeline.org). By contacting 988, a person will be connected to a trained crisis counselor and receive compassionate, accessible care when they or someone they know are experiencing mental health-related distress – whether that is thoughts of suicide, mental health or substance use crisis or any other kind of emotional distress.

The partnership will also include exclusive club content for WeAre8 with a dedicated intern that’s focus will be creating and posting content to the platform. WeAre8 will be visible across numerous club platforms, in addition visibility at games on team media backdrops and field boards throughout the 2025 season.

About WeAre8

“The People’s Platform”

WeAre8, founded by tech entrepreneur Zoe Kalar, is a transformational social media platform designed to provide a healthier digital home for humanity. People are protected from toxic content, your followers actually see your posts (no controlling algorithms), and everyone benefits because the money made from advertisers on WeAre8 is shared with people, communities, charities, and planet-saving projects. It’s more than just a platform—it’s a movement to shift the power of big tech back into the hands of the people. To learn more, visit www.WeAre8.com.

About NAMI Minnesota

NAMI Minnesota is a non-profit organization that works to improve the lives of children and adults with mental illnesses and their families through education, support, and advocacy programs. For more information or to arrange an interview, please contact Victor Molina, NAMI Minnesota Communications Coordinator, at marcomm@namimn.org.