Parents of teenagers in Britain are increasingly dismayed and alarmed by the growing mental health crisis and the escalating levels of anxiety and depression among their children. It seems scandalous that research into such a serious national problem receives a mere 5.5 per cent of the UK health research budget while fewer than 40 per cent of young people can access mental health support.

Against this gloomy backdrop comes a new initiative that could radically change the landscape. BrainWaves is a creative, transformative response led by Oxford University, comprising the largest-ever study of wellbeing across 50,000 students aged 11-19. It’s been developed in tandem with the online daily newspaper The Day, which uses the data to create exciting teaching resources and lessons. At the heart of this long-term programme is BrainWaves’ state-of-the-art Secure eResearch Platform, hosted by the University of Swansea.

Full recruitment for the study will start in September and the resulting information will be used to develop effective, empirical, therapeutic interventions and educational resources at scale. Ultimately, BrainWaves aims to build a complete programme of free mental health education.

It’s taken three years of painstaking research and academic groundwork just to launch this ambitious project and it’s been made possible with funding raised by a group of Founding Friends, many of them concerned parents. Led by Princess Dora Loewenstein, the Founding Friends include Toby Constantine, Nick Evans-Lombe and the Syncona Foundation. In just a year up to last August, private individuals and family foundations donated £1 million. Now, these friends and a range of high-net-worth individuals are rallying to lay on a spectacular fundraising dinner at Bridgewater House, on Green Park.

There has been a house on the site since the 17th century and it was redesigned in Palazzo style by Sir Charles Barry in the 1840s and completed in 1854 for Lord Ellesmere, heir to the Duke of Bridgewater. It contained a renowned collection of about 70 paintings, now on loan to the National Gallery of Scotland. After the building’s art gallery was bombed in 1941, it was adapted for office use. In 1981 the Latsis family bought the house and restored it. As their home, it is not open to the public, so it is a coup for the Founding Friends to be hosting a dinner there.

This laudable effort on behalf of a small group of individuals, many with City careers, shows that when City folk gather in aid of a good cause, they can be supremely effective. Teenage mental health is a crisis on a dramatic scale and there have been no solutions or adequate coordinated responses to it. Now, the expertise and technology are in place, and brilliant Oxford University experts are poised to begin the next phase of the research. If sufficient money is raised, this could be the breakthrough that transforms the entire teenage mental health landscape. City donations have already been generous, but there is plenty of opportunity for more and a relatively small donation allows individuals or foundations to become a named Founding Friend.

Sarah Montague, the celebrated broadcaster and presenter of Radio 4’s World at One programme will be speaking at the event. Asa mother of four girls, she is well aware of the challenges facing the younger generation and how they seem to be struggling with an epidemic of anxiety and depression. As she says, ‘Something is happening with our children. We need to know what. That’s what BrainWaves is about – providing research that is long overdue.

Become a BrainWaves Founding Friend and join the conversation by making a donation at development.ox.ac.uk