Hello Marguerite

Welcome to the list. 

I am afraid I have nothing to report on the peer-support front but will be
very interested to hear what others may be doing.

Happy Holidays to you too.

Carl

-----Original Message-----
From: Marguerite Schinkel [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: 21 December 2005 09:59
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [COMMUNITYPSYCHUK] what are people up to in the field?


Hi everyone,

having taken the community psychology courses both in Stirling as an
undergraduate unit and in Manchester at Masters level, with their
emphasis on participative learning and getting out there and putting
things in practice, I find it interesting that this listserv is mostly
occupied with theory. 

In any case, I was wondering if there are considerations of
confidentiality that are stopping people from sharing information about
the projects they are working on.  As a just-starting-out person with a
Masters in community psychology, but not much luck in finding truly
community psychological vacancies I am working as a freelance researcher
at the moment and would love to know more about the things that are
happening all over the UK. 

I am working on the evaluation of a peer-support project for
ex-prisoners. People who have left prison are recruited to train for a
year for an NVQ2 in advice and guidance and spend a lot of their time
actually supporting vulnerable (self-selected) prisoners, both in prison
shortly before release and in the community once they have been
liberated. (They can either be paid or remain on benefits). This has
been welcomed by the prisoners, who often have had very negative
experiences with "professionals" during their lives and because they get
met at the gate of the prison it greatly reduces the chance that they
will go straight to drink or drugs upon release. There are problems with
the project, but the idea is good and it is definitely having a positive
impact already, despite its flaws.

I also went to a peer support conference in Glasgow recently, which was
very inclusive with lots of community members there, with keynote
speakers from the US. It is amazing how they have transformed mental
health services in Georgia (I think it was) by introducing peer support,
even in emergency mental health wards etc., but strange that not more
examples of peer support in Scotland and the UK were used. In my
workshop we felt that one way of getting peer support to have more
impact in the Scottish context, it would be useful to find out what peer
support projects already exist and to link these up so they can have a
united voice. In the discussion this was limited to Scotland, probably
for funding and policy reasons, but I am wondering what is happening all
over the UK and whether having community psychologists involved means
that projects are less top-down and more inclusive with more input both
from the people being supported and the peers providing the support.

I have found the theoretical discussion interesting, but more in a
"let's see what these people are up to now" kind of way. When I was
studying at MMU I found the theoretical disagreement amongst the people
working there very difficult, finding that different staff members felt
different issues were important and not knowing how to work with this
when handing in pieces of work, but now that it doesn't affect me I find
it interesting to see what people have to say.

Happy holidays,

Marguerite.
-- 
  Marguerite Schinkel
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