The Peer Helpers program helps build connections and provide support, set in a healthy environment. This is what social studies teachers Abigail Yates and Samuel Grimes are trying to bring into the peer helpers: a supportive network of students available to the entirety of the student body. Whether it is an in-person meeting or anonymously online, these peers are ready to help. 

Peer Helpers is a program designed to help students in a way adults cannot. The majority, if not all teens feel more supported by people their age over an adult. Other teens are experiencing similar struggles that come with growing up and surviving high school.

 When “staff members get to a point where they can’t help a student, they have a helpline relying on the Peer Helper program,” counselor Chelsea Dodds explained. Students can also find resources to get the next level of support that a teacher or trusted adult may not know about. 

The Peer Helpers are also hoping to reach the “therapist friends”. This term is used often by Gen Z to describe people who are always helping others and often neglect themselves. They are the first person their friends go to for mental health support. Although they are also in need of help or just someone to listen to them.  They may not have anyone to go to, but the Peer Helpers are here to support these supporters.

 “Even within my own friend group, it’s given me the resources that I need to be able to better help the people around me. It also gives me the resources for if something goes above my head. I have a place that I can refer people to or if I personally think something is too much for my own mental health,” senior Gaven Boren said.

These students are given the resources to support other students as well as themselves. The select few are going on a retreat this October to ready themselves with the tools they need in order to support themselves and their peers. They will focus on building a community and network of resources for themselves and their peers. 

“We are really trying to arm the Peer Helpers with the resources that are within the school and the community so that if they feel they can’t get the student where they need to be by just listening and having a conversation with them, they can point them in the right direction,” Yates said. 

With the coming of a new year and covid finally dying down the new leaders of the program, Yates and Grimes, are ready to rebuild. They plan on making Peer Helpers more visible in the school and available to all students. This is a huge aspect of the Peer Helpers and it is crucial to the success of the program’s outreach. 

“This year, we’re hoping to create some sort of way for all the students to contact a peer helper even if they don’t know them,” Yates explained. 

The Peer Helpers anonymous helpline is a huge mental health resource for students. It is a way for them to connect with a Peer Helper and get support any time they need it. This year, Yates and Grimes plan on making the helpline more known within the school and accessible to all students.

“We’re really going to try and expand the reach of the Peer Helpers so any student can anonymously contact Peer Helpers to talk about something online,” Yates said.