Improving the Lives of Young People with Serious Mental Health Conditions Through Research & Training

Register for April's Monthly Consultation: "Self-care and Setting Boundaries for Youth Peer Support Specialists"

Posted 04-07-21

Date/Time: April 22, 10am PT / 1pm ET

In this call, our team of experienced youth peer support supervisors will discuss how to support youth peer support specialists in practicing self-care and setting boundaries with their youth clients.

Watch Recording of February's Monthly Consultation: "How Youth Partners Collaborate with Family Partners, Part 2"

Posted 02-21-21

In this call, we continued to review how youth and family partners support youth, families, and Wraparound teams individually and collectively. We presented different principles for how youth and family partners work together, and applied said principles to various scenarios.

New Journal Article: "EASA Connections: Community-Based Participatory Research to Develop a Peer-Based Early Psychosis Web Resource With Young Adults"

Posted 01-04-21

This article describes a community-based participatory research (CBPR) approach to develop a peer-driven, web-based, recovery resource for young adults who have experienced early psychosis. The researchers used the CBPR process to collaboratively develop the resource and conducted an iterative usability study to test and refine it.

Watch Recording of November's Monthly Consultation: "Strengths, Passions, Achievements, and Motivators (SPAM)"

Posted 12-07-20

In November's call we discussed how youth peer support specialists (PSSs) engage in strengths-based conversations with young people, using the framework of "Strengths, Passions, Achievements, and Motivators (SPAM)." Discussing strengths can feel uncomfortable, distressing or phony for youth clients. In this call we focused on specific techniques that PSSs can use to help ensure a comfortable and engaging conversation that builds both the PSSs' and the youth's awareness and genuine appreciation of the young person's SPAM.

Watch Recording of March's Monthly Consultation: "Youth Peer Support Specialists' Role in Crisis Intervention and Postvention"

Posted 03-25-21

In this call, our team covered youth peer support specialists' roles in crisis intervention and postvention. Learning objectives included how to create crisis and safety plans with youth, appropriate responses from youth peer support specialists while maintaining boundaries, and how youth peer support specialists can support youth after a crisis event.

Watch Recording of January's Monthly Consultation: "How Youth Partners Collaborate with Family Partners, Part 1"

Posted 01-27-21

In this call, we reviewed how youth and family partners support youth, families, and Wraparound teams individually and collectively. We presented different principles for how youth and family partners work together, and applied said principles to various scenarios.

Watch Recording of December's Monthly Consultation: "Self-Care in Youth/Young Adult Peer Support"

Posted 12-18-20

In December's call we discussed the importance of self-care for staff and youth clients. The holidays are often a confusing and challenging time for youth involved in systems, and young people can benefit from having a self-care plan. We covered conversational strategies to approach this topic with youth and how to normalize the process of creating a self-care plan. We also included an open discussion of topics and scenarios submitted by participants.

Watch Recording of October's Monthly Consultation: "Clarifying Your Peer Support Role/s"

Posted 11-04-20

The topic of this call from October 22 was "Clarifying Your Peer Support Role/s." Research has shown that role clarity contributes to employees' work satisfaction and retention. We explored what this means in the context of youth/young adult peer support, and shared resources to help with role clarification. We also asked participants about their priorities for future meeting topics.