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A Mental Health Chatbot for High School Students

Mar 3, 2025

I know my last post about AI was a bit of a bummer, but it’s not like I think it’s all bad. I was reading TechCrunch and came across a story about a startup called Sonar Mental Health that’s built an AI chatbot named Sonny to help students with mental health support. Considering everything we hear about how teens are handling, well, everything these days, this seems like one of the more useful directions AI could go.

TL;DR Takeaways

  • Sonny is an AI-supported mental health chatbot from Sonar Mental Health, with humans reviewing the AI’s suggested responses
  • Sonar says its Wellbeing Companions have backgrounds in psychology, social work, and crisis-line support
  • Sonny is available by text, which makes it easier for students to reach out when counselors are stretched thin
  • Early results sound promising, but this is exactly the kind of thing where the details matter
  • Sonar recently raised $2.4 million to expand access

What’s Cool about It

Sonny isn’t just spitting out canned advice. When a student texts in, the AI drafts a response, but before anything is sent back, a real person reviews it. TechCrunch says Sonar’s current review team has backgrounds in psychology, social work, and crisis-line support, which is good to see, though I am still curious what the exact training and escalation process looks like.

And it’s available by text, so students can reach out about school, relationships, stress, whatever’s on their mind. I’m not exactly sure how it all works. If a human has to review every single message before it’s sent, how fast can it really be? How scalable is that model long-term? But it’s still nice to see actual guardrails in place. Sonny also tries to pick up on early signs of distress (with permission) by analyzing conversations and, if needed, helping connect students to real therapists.

Also, major props to them for taking privacy seriously. Sonar says it is COPPA and FERPA compliant, and that it doesn’t sell student data.

Why It Matters

The mental health situation in schools is rough right now. The Education Department says 17% of high schools don’t even have a counselor, and most states have way too many students assigned per counselor. I remember it not being great when I was in school, and that was before cyberbullying and Instagram influencers leading unrealistic lives and almost weekly mass shootings and everything else teens have to deal with now.

Since launching in 2024, Sonny has rolled out to more than 4,500 students across nine districts. Sonar says schools using Sonny have reported better attendance rates and higher student well-being scores. And they just raised $2.4 million to expand, backed by names like Nina Capital and Stanford’s Social Impact Fellowship.

Final Thoughts

AI gets a lot of bad press (sometimes deservedly), but things like Sonny are why I don’t want to write the whole category off. If you build the system with real human oversight, clear privacy rules, and a narrow job to do, AI can fill gaps that already exist. Not replace humans. Fill gaps.

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