Stella’s Place Peer Ambassadors have lived experience with mental health and recovery, and are trained to provide support to other young adults experiencing mental health challenges.
What is Peer Support?
Having “been there” themselves, a Peer Supporter can listen and respond from a place of true understanding. Being in a different place in their recovery process, they can communicate hope and optimism to the participants they support. The values of respect, choice, and mutual sharing form the basis of the peer relationship.
Peer support roles can have many different titles including Peer Worker, Peer Ambassador, Peer Supporter, and Peer Support Worker.
At Stella’s Place, young adult Peer Ambassadors facilitate programs, support groups, and activities, and support folks one-on-one. Peer Ambassadors can help participants navigate the mental health system to get their needs met.
Our Peer Support Initiatives
My Next Chapter: Our Peer Support Training Program at Stella’s Place
Comprehensive and free, our Peer Support Training Program helps individuals aged 18 to 29 build their personal peer support practice. Our training takes place once a week over 4 months. Each training group has a maximum of 15 people.
Community Healing Project – Completed 2023
A trauma-informed approach to community violence that helped equip young adults with mental health skills. The Community Healing Project engaged young people who live in or are connected with one of the communities that the project was working with.
Pathway to Peers at Mount Sinai Hospital – Completed 2022
This partnership placed a Peer Support Worker trained by Stella’s Place into the emergency department at Sinai. The Peer Support Workers were able to help from a place of understanding for young people coming into emergency in distress.
UofT Mississauga Peer Support Program
We are working with the University of Toronto Mississauga Students’ Union to develop and support a campus Peer Support Program. This involves facilitating a yearly training program for the volunteers who will provide services on campus.
“Meeting someone who has been there, who listens to you, who shows that they ‘get it’— it makes you feel a little less lonely, and a little bit more like, “OK, if someone else can manage this, then maybe there is some hope: like this life can be do-able.”
–Victoria, Participant
“You have to know your community—respect them and want to help them, but understand their needs. Working with people is more about listening to them, being present and not about jumping to solutions or problem solving too soon. I’m able to combine my training with my own experiences and reach others in a really personal way.”
-Abdul, former Youth Peer Mentor Coordinator
