UMass‑Donahue
Young Adult Peer Mentoring                                                                            MAY 9, 2019
11:00 A.M.

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>> Good afternoon, everyone.  My name is Kelly English, I'm the director of the children's behavioral health center at the Massachusetts department of mental health.  Thank you so much for joining us this afternoon for our second supervisor roundtable webinar on supporting self‑reflection and navigating common early young adult peer mentoring role challenges.  Before we get started on the presentation for today, just a few reminders and things to be aware of.  Our final supervisor roundtable webinar is coming up on June 13th.  The link to register is on the center's website on the webinars page.  You can also navigate to it here on the important links pod.  The resources and handouts pod includes a PDF of the slide deck from today.  We'll also be posting the slide deck on the Knowledge Center's website so you can share that with colleagues who may not have been able to join us today.  We will also be recording today's webinar, and we will post it early next week on the Center's website.  
	So with that, I am going to turn it over it my colleague, Vanessa Klodnick, at Thresholds in Chicago, Illinois.  Vanessa has been our trainer here in Massachusetts for several years now, working with our young adult peer mentoring providers throughout the state.  She is going to be sharing with us some experiences and sticky situations from her many years of experience supervising young adult peers, and we'll be doing some role plays with a couple of here colleagues from Thresholds.  So at this point, Vanessa, I'm going to turn it over to you.  
>> VANESSA: Great.  Thanks, Kelly.  Hi, everyone.  I'm super excited for the second live supervision opportunity with folks to actually see what reflective supervision looks like with young adults in peer roles.  And we have some great, great situations that you may have already experienced and are dealing with or have thought about and then, like, ooh, that feels like it would be uncomfortable.  And I wouldn't know what to do.  And so I hope that our role plays today really ping you deep in your body emotionally, too, that really in your body you're, like, oh, that, I wouldn't know what to do.  How would you, you know, navigate that, and what would it look like.  And I hope we can have a really awesome conversation about the situations.  So I'm going to set up some of those in just a minute.  And I wanted to ‑‑ I think I can cue this.  Hold on one second.  Great.  
	So really quickly, a little bit about me, if you are joining us for the first time, I have someone with, as Kelly said, many years of experience supervising or championing efforts around young adults in peer roles, in a variety of peer roles.  I'm most impressed with Massachusetts and the young adult peer mentor role is really incredible to be a part of what is actually a movement, I would say, that Massachusetts is leading the country in operationalizing what is young adult peer support and peer mentoring.  I'm creating tools like this and practice to really help organizations and supervisors to do a great job of supporting young people that provide in these roles.  I bring a unique light to this work because I am a social worker by training, but I became so interested in asking why, the how and what do we know and understand about peer mentoring and peer support that I went back to school, and now I actually study peer support interventions and vocational interventions for older youth and young adults.  And I work with folks all across the country, so many of the sticky situations that I bring are not only my own, they come from all sorts of folks all across the country who are actually struggling with really similar things.  And I hear y'all loud and clear on feedback on evaluations when I've been doing trainings in person that, you know, relational boundaries and having to navigate that.  How do you help young adults in peer roles develop, you know, very simple skills like email etiquette and also professionalism in the workplace and, of course, writing Medicaid billable is always something that comes up.  And my goal in my work is really to support supervisors in having a set of principles that guide their practice in supervision to support the on the job thriving of young adults in peer roles.  
	And quickly, I have these pictures on here because I like to model in all my trainings and technical assistance, ways that you can be really relatable.  And part of being a really excellent supervisor of young adults in peer roles is that you have to role model.  And you have to be a mentor yourself and a coach and someone who is able to really get young adults in peer roles to open up.  And if you like to check out the section on the next slide, I have a ton of resources.  We've done webinars a couple of times where I talk a lot about the working alliance and how you form that as a supervisor with young adults in peer roles.  One way to really do that is to find things to relate on.  And I love exercises and talking about astrology which you might think, like, oh, you know, you have a Ph.D. and you're supposed to be really into science and scientific method and astrology.  But you know what?  Everyone has a birthday that it falls in, zones or signs.  And what's so great about Instagram, one group that I follow posts these hilarious things about like representation of signs.  Even amongst my colleagues, I'll joke and say which one are you and creating ways to relate that don't necessarily have to do with serious mental health conditions and all the struggles that our young people have that can make them laugh and think about, like, oh, and this is an example of a bird.  Like fun little exercise that I like to do.  With my friends and my colleagues.  
	And also a little bit about me.  Young people are always on their phones.  They're showing pictures.  As a supervisor, you know, being, like, open to being, like, oh, yeah, you went to that thing?  Can I see that picture?  And last month we did a sticky situation role play around using the phone as an engagement tool and how that can open up all sorts of stuff, right?  It can change relationships.  It can get really personal really fast.  You can see a text pop up as you're showing your phone someone else that might say something inappropriate.  There's all sorts of fun that's introduced into our work.  But as a supervisor, how do you model that having your phone is okay and sharing pictures is good.  I love thinking about how pictures really represent who we are.  Again, this is getting beyond the strategic storytelling around having a mental illness or being in residential care or experiencing trauma, which we all debate, and we can get into this a little bit later as I'm resonating with people about, like, are those okay or not okay, like topics for young adults that I supervise in peer roles to use in their practice.  But different ways, exploring who you are.  It's not just your mental health stuff.  Here I have a couple pictures.  One of me in New York actually yesterday in Central Park.  I went running.  I love to run.  And Central Park is just so amazing.  And already this morning I talked to three people about Central Park and how odd it is that there's this magical nature thing in the middle of this, like, super urban sprawl.  It's so incredible and then find out other people have gone there and just to have that connection over a shared, like, travel experience, super cool.  And then I have a picture of a sandcastle that I built.  When I'm on vacation, I like to get up and build a giant sandcastle and attract every young person on the beach to build with me.  But these are the kinds of things that you can share as a supervisor, but get into, like, who you are and asking, you know, folks like oh, you just did that.  Oh, you have pictures?  Tell me about that.  Asking young adults in peer roles, like that's how Millennials are communicating and connecting, and I think, you know, and if you're a Millennial and a supervisor, try to really not be afraid of having mutuality there and asking, like, oh, like let me see.  Let me see.  We all go to show our friends our pictures, but do we do it in the workplace?  My challenge for you guys is to integrate ways you can be relatable as a supervisor, to staff and young adults in peer roles in photography.  Because our phones are identity exploration devices which I don't think we think about them like that, but they are.  
	Really quickly, if you're new to this, I just want to put a plug in, young adult peer mentor supervision guide.  It has tons and tons of activities that you can use in your supervision practice.  If you're, like, oh, gosh, this young person is really struggling and this work ‑‑ like they don't feel like they have any boundaries.  I'm really worried about their practice, worried about decision‑making.  They don't seem professional.  Guess what, the practice file on the website are fantastic.  They will walk you through and we're going to have an example later of us using the practice profile to help improve practice in young adults in a peer role and really explore and reflect on practice and examine practice.  But just to know these are amazing, amazing resources and I want to highlight them.  Also if you're an administrator on the call and are just feeling like peer mentors in your organization are not integrated in an effective, successful, really meaningful way, check out this toolkit.  It will provide you with lots of guidance on more systematic policy‑level within your organization that can help young adults in peer roles really thrive.  
	Okay.  Just really quickly, I went over this last month in the learning collaborative.  But just the four principles of young adult peer mentor supervision from my perspective are that your supervision sessions need to be consistent.  This is arguably important for all of your supervision with all staff that you work with.  They also have to be collaborative.  There needs to be a strong alliance or relationship between the supervisor and young adults in peer roles.  And I know that sounds like really obvious.  It's not as easy as you would think.  And even starting this out, talking about like how could you use photography on your phone to create relatability and mutuality, like, little things like that matter for cultivating trust.  But it's tricky to do that.  We often are very intentional about power differentials between a supervisor and staff for a variety of reasons.  But with this work, because we're role modelling for our young adult peer mentors, how to be both professional but also relatable and someone that can be trusted with information and is also going to be helpful.  You have to be a little bit more transparent and authentic and genuine, and that's what's going to cultivate that strong relationship.  It's also going to keep your young adults in peer roles when they get stressed out and overwhelmed and burnt out on the job, they're going to be more likely to be up front and tell you that instead of hide it.  It's really important.  
	I have a ton of webinars actually on that on the website.  Go check them out if that's something you realize you're like oh, my gosh, I need to get some support around this.  Also supervision needs to be reflective.  It is incredibly important.  You'll see examples of reflective supervision shortly.  Supervision isn't just about really problem solving and you as a supervisor telling your young people in peer roles what to do.  It's about helping young people figure out who they are on the job, building their professional identity, helping them understand the dynamics.  They're so complex with young adults as they are becoming adults or as they're transitioning to adulthood.  And all the interesting sticky situations that come up and being, like, you know what?  These are totally typical.  Like we feel the time process and really being able to validate that through reflection and we'll have some examples of that shortly.  And also that your supervision needs to be developmentally attuned.  And what I mean by that is you are supervising young people in peer roles, most likely.  You have to be thoughtful and aware of what it means to be a young adult in today's society and just really thoughtful about the level of instability, what social media is doing, what technology is doing and just how fast paced and different and stressed out many of our young people are, being aware of that.  And that plays into self‑care and wellness on the job, but it is really important if we expect these young people in peer roles to be effective role models to young people with mental health conditions, we need to be thoughtful as supervisors about that experience.  
	And of course making it about career development and professional development.  Really quickly, there's six domains to the practice profile.  There are reflections you guys have them in today's webinar, but they are on the CBH knowledge website.  I'm going to be walking us through one of the reflection forms today so you can see it in practice.  And this is actually a snippet from what they look like where young people in peer roles by themselves and/or with their supervisor, they're going to do it together as a supervisor and young adult peer mentor working together to really reflect and examine, you know, where is my practice in this area.  Like do I rate ‑‑ am I really good at that?  I'm, like, not good and why.  And where I might need some improvement.  And this is where you as a supervisor get to do some coaching which I think is really fun.  
	The two scenarios we're going to process today are going to touch on some big, big themes that I have seen here at Thresholds in Chicago but also across the country, to be honest, is young people in peer roles not being really effectively integrated, not being heard, and also paired with, like, real situations in the community when you're interacting with community members and then you've got young people in peer roles that are, you know, facilitating and role modelling in the role, in the community with one or more young people, all the stuff that could happen.  And that would be a really great scenario.  And then also we're going to talk about what happens when young adult in a peer role feels like a failure because they're having, like, a big problem engaging young people and really taking it personally that, like, they're not effective which typically happens.  Like this happens ‑‑ I've actually seen it in many young people who engage in helping professional roles that there's, like, probably six to nine months, there's this kind of like oh, my God, the system is awful.  Like the system is so bad.  Like how is anyone ‑‑ how is my individual work with these young people in this family going to make any difference?  And really thinking about that as a supervisor, how you can use your lived experience with that.  You've gone through that.  You've had that moment of really being frustrated and how you can really talk about where there is opportunity to really partner and mentor and build on competencies and resiliencies and also fight the system and advocate for change, too, because that inevitably is part of being a peer mentor is cultivating change within your organization and beyond.  And that's also really good, you want to engage your young adult clients, having activities where you are doing advisory work or any type of trying to get change to happen on a community level.  Huge, huge engagement tactics that young adults can get involved in.  A slightly different piece of mentoring I'm super involved with lately.  
	And also we're going to do a little bit of reflecting and examination of the building collaborative relationships module within the young adult practice profile.  That I think will be really fun in reflecting on where is there an opportunity to do a better job.  So I hope these are going to be great things for us to process today.  And one quick thing before we get started with the role plays, says this is something that's really important and it's really tricky to balance, but I think it's worth mentioning.  And this is definitely something that I've been thinking a lot this last year.  That's something I would have been able to even have gotten to unless I was doing this work for a really long time.  But this idea of supervision being for young adult peer mentors.  And so your young adult peer mentors, they come to your office or you've jointly decided‑upon meeting place and they've got some needs.  And you want these young people in peer roles to identify some of their sticky situations, some of the things that, like, gosh, I don't know what to do with this and you want them thinking about that and coming to the supervision session like with that.  But at the same time, you also have to instill ‑‑ and this is what my guidebook has a bunch of exercises ‑‑ professional development ongoing.  It has to be this balance that you're encouraging reflection, not just on your individual work with a particular young person, but across your young people and aggregate, how am I doing?  How am I doing with my engagement?  How am I doing with my relationships with my colleagues?  How am I doing with telling my story?  How am I doing with, you know, introducing myself in the community?  Like it is a really interesting thing to be thinking about that, and that is directly what the young adult peer mentor reflection forms really help a young person in a peer role and a supervisor to do is to create a time and a space using these tools, and you can do it in supervision sessions, to use these tools to be reflective and aggregate across all of your young people, how is it going?  And so this is just focusing on like a particular sticky situation.  And many of you who have known me for a long time and on the call and thank you for joining me today, have seen my thinking around this, I think this balance thing is really, really important, and we know our young people when we surveyed them in peer roles, they want more professional development.  And I think that this is the thing that we as supervisors, we love to put out fires.  We love to be in the moment, problem solving, and I love a supervision session that's driven by a young person who is a peer mentor.  I love not having to come with an agenda.  Who doesn't?  Okay, here's my five things I need to follow up with you on.  I'm, like, yeah, here's the two I have.  That's cool.  But that's not a professional development that's strategic, intentional or ongoing.  So here is my plug today is to watch what we do which I hope is a helpful example and I hope this is already you guys hearing me, thinking about questions you have or maybe some ideas and innovation that you've done in your practice as a supervisor to really support ongoing professional development in these young adult peer roles.  Okay.  
	So to introduce just quickly to tell you how this is going to go, we're going to switch it up a little, too.  We're going to have about a ten‑minute scenario of me as a supervisor and one of my colleagues, Erin, is my colleague who's going to be going first, and it's going to be live.  And while it's live, I want you to use the chat box and respond to the questions that are there, like, you know, what are you noticing?  What's going well with this supervision?  What do I like about it?  What do I not like?  Were there any concerns that you had?  Were you, like, oh, my gosh, like that was really weird and you felt uncomfortable?  I want you to really feel your gut in this and, like, that was weird.  Wow, she did that.  That's cool.  I could do that.  And also thinking about, like, have you experienced situations like this before and, you know, how did you handle them?  Do you have suggestions for how I might have handled it differently.  We would love that.  So use these chat boxes really actively, that would be super, super cool.  And so I think we're going to switch this over, Kathryn, if you want to make it live.  I'm going to get it set up.  Hello, everyone.  Okay.  
>> Hey, Kelly.  
>> Let me move the phone.  Hold on one second.  Don't hang up.  Okay.  We're good.  All right.  Here we go.  All right.  Hey, Erin.  
>> Hi.  How are you?  
>> I'm okay.  How are you doing?  
>> Pretty good.  Pretty good.  
>> So I was talking to someone, and I don't know, something about a platform?  
>> Oh, yeah.  So I was with a couple members.  We were going downtown.  We were on the Red Line or getting on the Red Line.  I had them meet me at the Dunkin' Donuts to get a coffee to go while we were waiting for another member to show up.  A young man came up to me and approached me kind of hitting on me, asking me out, "hey girl," you know, whatever.  And I was just, like, you know, "no.  I'm not interested."   
>> Wait.  This isn't a member, this is like ‑‑ 
>> This is a stranger.  
>> Okay, stranger.  
>> Stranger off the street.  Somebody just trying to pick me up.  Both of my members are with me, they're standing very close to me, like not even a foot, right?  We're all just chatting.  And so I tell the gentleman, like no, I'm over it.  Leave me alone, right?  So he proceeds to take this and be, like, very offended.  Now, I'm unclear if maybe he had, like, some mental illness himself or something because of his reaction did not fit what I said.  I just said, no, thank you, you know.  And went back to talking with the members.  Anyway, so he was, you know, started essentially verbally berating me, screaming and obscenities and the whole thing.  And I was just, like, trying to remain calm.  But I was a little afraid.  Like he's a big dude.  Like screaming in the street.  I don't know what he's capable of.  We're not in the best neighborhood.  And so I was a little bit, like, okay.  I hope the other member shows up, the one that we were waiting on.  And this guy was still, like ‑‑ 
>> How were the other members reacting to this?  
>> They were still just trying to, like, talk.  Like trying to, like, ignore it almost.  But they obviously knew what was going on.  They were, like, what?  Whatever.  But they saw the entire interaction.  So it wasn't like they were totally oblivious.  They knew what was happening.  And so then finally our third and last member arrived, and we got on the train and we sat down on the train.  I was shooken up.  I was shooken up.  Like it was scary.  But because I said, you just don't know what people are capable of in this day and age.  So I was a little scared.  And one of the members said, you know ‑‑ 
>> But you were, like, still trying to, like, role model.  
>> Yeah.  I'm still trying to engage the members and whatever.  And one of the members asked me, that was weird.  And I just said, like, straight up, I was, like, yeah.  I was scared.  I was really scared.  
>> What was that like for you to say that to a member?  
>> Well, you know, I want to be honest with them.  In those situations because those are real‑life situations.  It could happen to anyone at any time.  And so I just wanted to ‑‑ and they knew I was scared.  So if I was going to try to play it off, then I would have come off like I was lying, I think.  Or trying to portray myself as tough.  And one of the members looked at me and he's, like, Ms. Erin, don't ever worry.  We got you.  We got your back.  If that dude would have done something, like we would have had you.  And that was sweet, you know, so good to hear that.  But yeah, I was just honest with them.  And I processed.  I had them, you know, were you guys scared or what did you think or whatever?  And they're teenage boys so they were, like, whatever.  That dude was crazy, you know.  But I just wanted to check in because I was scared.  So not to take away from anyone's experience.  I wanted to make sure, like, well, were you scared?  Were you worried?  Or did you think it was going to go further, like physical?  And they were pretty relaxed about it.  But they just thought, well, that's weird but we always see kind of crazy people.  You know, I think they're kind of numb to it.  
>> So do you think that, like, you maybe shouldn't go to that stop anymore, we could avoid you having that experience?  
>> Well, there's a problem with that because that's honestly the safest place for us to meet.  Otherwise I'm putting myself in danger walking.  
>> What do you mean?  
>> To the group home.  Well, I've had other times before I decided to make Dunkin' Donuts the meet‑up where I would walk almost a mile from the Red Line to the group home.  And I'm walking alone in the winter, it gets darker early.  And it's not a great neighborhood.  And I've been hit on before.  I've been followed.  I've had people physically grab my arm and say come here.  And so I just made the decision that we're going to meet in a lit public place.  Sometimes there are police in the parking lot, you know, they're going into Dunkin' Donuts.  It does happen.  And so it's just, like, the safest ‑‑ I don't think there really is a better option.  In the Red Line we use that train a lot to get places.  
>> So afterwards that happened and then how are you feeling as you're on the train with the young people?  
>> You know, I'm just kind of, like, I had to shake it off, but I was kind of like icky for maybe five minutes but it did help listening to their thoughts and even for me to say, like, you know, yeah, that was kind of scary or that was weird or just to say that with them, and we all kind of just processed it.  And then we went and had a great time.  
>> What was it like to have, like, the young people offer to protect you?  
>> Well, it feels nice to have them say that.  "A," it makes me feel like they care about me and respect me and that I'm making an impact on them the same way that in certain ways they make an impact on me.  But it is challenging to be female in this field and, you know, alone in those situations.  So it just gives you a little bit of comfort and a little bit of security.  If that guy had tried to attack me or something, I never want to put the members in that position, obviously.  But it definitely puts my mind at ease that I'm not just, like, out there alone.  
>> How do you think it impacted your relationship with them, if at all?  Do you think it changed anything?  
>> No.  I think they probably forgot.  Like if you asked them now ‑‑ would they?  No, I think like we had all kind of been through that together.  
>> Yeah.  It's really interesting to think about your work in the community, right?  And you're on the stop, you know, I've been at that train stop.  I know exactly, like, the context you're, like, yeah, it is the safest place, maybe, right there.  And that you've got these, you know, young people you're trying to, like, act professional.  Do you think you would have responded differently, like, in your own life to this man if you just had them there?  
>> Maybe.  
>> Really?  
>> I might have ‑‑ I might have, like, stood up for myself a little bit more or, you know, maybe put my foot down and been a little bit more stern as opposed to kind of polite.  But then when I saw his reaction, I was really glad that I wasn't more stern because I was very polite, and that was his reaction, completely crazy.  
>> Yeah.  
>> I was glad.  The first time I may have done something different.  But then nowadays, like I said, you have to be careful what you say to anybody.  
>> I mean, I cannot stop thinking about this example because I just think, like, the uniqueness of what you're doing where you're out with multiple young people going and doing something fun, right?  You're doing fun, you're role modelling.  You're engaging.  You're helping to cultivate the relationship between the young people themselves, right?  
>> Right.  
>> I mean, you're doing that.  And then you've got these external players, like all these people around you and that it creates an interesting dynamic where things could go super awry.  
>> Yeah.  
>> Like on a regular basis.  
>> I know.  Like terribly.  But, I mean, I'm lucky thus far not to have anything really bad happen.  But that was a glimpse of what could, you know, what could happen any time.  Especially when you're dealing with other members who have mental illness.  One of the boys who was with us, he has schizophrenia.  He has a hard time even, like, staying focused on, like, what's happening in the group.  And his reaction could have been adverse to that guy's reaction.  
>> How so?  
>> Well, that external stimuli of that guy screaming and yelling could have raised the member's stimuli and made him agitated, and then we could be talking about a whole different scenario of these men kind of going at it, and then I'm inserting myself potentially to break something up.  That originally started with me.  And then would end with that.  
>> I actually thought that that's where this was going to go, something was going to end up in a fight in a really dangerous, like, location, too.  Like treacherous on a train line platform that's, like, very narrow.  
>> Yeah.  
>> Did you think about that when you were on the train leaving?  It could have been so much worse?  
>> I mean, a little.  I don't think, like, oh, like someone's going to get pushed or oh, like, imminent, no.  But in hindsight, I'm thinking, like, well, they could have reacted to this gentleman and then, like, yo, whatever, leave her alone, blah, blah, blah, and then that actually.  
>> Why do you think they didn't?  Because that's where I thought ‑‑ 
>> Yeah.  
>> My gut, working in that program in the past, like I just ‑‑ I feel like that was where I thought that would go.  
>> I think maybe they didn't think that it was that serious or that, like, I had handled it because I was ignoring it.  They were following my lead to ignore it potentially.  And this is, you know, what you asked me before is if I could have ‑‑ if I was on my own and off work, how would I have reacted?  If I would have reacted, like, you know, don't talk to me like that or, you know, don't call me my name or you shut up.  I said no and that's it.  Whatever.  I could have been nasty.  Then they might have followed my lead in that way.  And then we would have maybe had a situation.  That didn't end so well.  
>> You know, I feel like it's surprising because we know one of the young people that you work with, like he has been really, really struggle, and it seems like the way that he handled this was in a way that, like, it seemed really resilient on his part that he didn't get in that fight and he didn't.  Do you think maybe we should bring this to the team to talk about, like, this is actually like a good experience with a young person?  Like it's an interesting where, yeah, it could have been really not good.  
>> Yeah.  
>> I mean, how do you think your colleagues would react if you were to share this with them and to frame it in a way, like, you know, that one of the young people, like, handled, like, his cool, like stayed cool in the situation, wanted to protect me but, like, didn't get involved?  Like for that young person, it's like a big deal.  
>> Yeah.  
>> I think, if I'm being frank, I think it would be cool to do that with somebody who might be, like, more aware of the fact that they did that.  
>> Hmm.  
>> Where in this particular case, this member, like I said, if we asked him about this scenario, I genuinely don't think that he would have had ‑‑ to, like, praise him for something he can't even remember seems a little ‑‑ in the moment or the next day, even, that could have been something that I would definitely look into.  But it's weeks past.  You know, he struggles with schizophrenia and lots of voices.  Sometimes he doesn't even know if I'm real.  
>> Mm‑hmm.  
>> So I would hate to try to have him struggle back to find that memory and then feel the pressure of, like, being thankful that we maybe, like, are praising him or giving him, like, saying something good and he's, like, struggling to even know what we're telling him.  If it was a different member, absolutely.  I think that that would be something we could go back and say you really kept your cool.  If this was somebody who deals with more behavioral issues, we could have said you could have beat that guy up.  Even though it would have been validated, maybe.  Protecting staff, whatever.  But that's not what we want from someone who continuously engages in violence and altercations.  So then it would have made ‑‑ that would have made more sense.  But I think in this particular scenario, I don't think it would, like, get anywhere.  I don't think it would land on a member and make that impact.  
>> One thing I've been thinking about, the follow‑up, I think we talked about it two meetings ago was around, like, feeling that a couple of your team members, like, just don't respect you.  And don't want ‑‑ well, mainly just kind of tell you ‑‑ oh, I think it's still working ‑‑ is tell you what to do.  Like how are you feeling about that?  When we came up with, like, a couple of things that thought might improve it.  
>> Yeah.  Well, you know, it's interesting because I think that they think I don't work as hard as I do because they don't see me as often as they see their other coworkers.  I get to kind of come and go as I please.  I'm in a different role.  And now I'm in another role where I'm coming over here and I have two different supervisors and it's this whole thing.  I think they think that I just, like, mess around.  Just like having fun and living life.  And it's like if you could live a day in my shoes, you would understand that that's not the case.  And so sometimes I think they can ask me to do their jobs for them or put things off on me.  Can you run this for me because I have to run the kids to the dentist and I'm going to be moving around the whole city.  Like it's intense.  And it's just, like, sometimes I just feel like they ‑‑ 
>> How do you ‑‑ I like that example that you just had.  They don't know what you do.  How ‑‑ like how might we figure out a way for them to really get it?  Like I don't know.  I mean ‑‑ 
>> I don't know.  It's difficult.  I don't know.  
>> Do they ever go on activities with you?  
>> Yeah.  No, they don't go out with me.  If I do activities during the day like during spring break or something, eight to four hours, I might have like a backup staff.  
>> Okay.  But even sometimes, they don't come with me often.  
>> Interesting.  
>> Like they know what I do.  They know I take the kids out and whatever, but they don't know the inner workings of, you know, my girls and my progression and I think sometimes they see little things like I've got my own office now and they sent me flowers and they've never gotten any of that.  They're, like, she doesn't even do anything and now she's getting rewarded.  What they don't know is all the stuff behind the scenes that I do.  And I don't know a great way to tell them or to explain to them, like, my role without it sounding arrogant or without it sounding, like, I'm better than you.  
>> Yeah, I feel you.  It is an interesting dynamic to think about, you know, connecting with young people in a different way, right, than they do and not really getting it.  Especially being in a community, I think your role is unique because you're out and about connecting with young people in a different way, and they see it as fun.  Do you think that they have fun?  
>> No.  
>> Interesting.

>> Not a lot.  Maybe, I don't know.  They're in the office all the time.  They don't get to be outside.  They don't get to ‑‑ you know what I mean?  And when they're with members, it's, like, you know, maintenance or the doctor ‑‑ 
>> You are more relatable, more real.  We talked about this before where you can see into a different language.  To relate in a way.  We have this great conversation.  And for the folks watching, we're going to end really shortly to process this.  But I want to highlight this.  Where we are talking about, like, a crisis and the words that your colleagues used, you don't understand that.  
>> Yeah.  
>> You aren't ‑‑ the way you're processing, like, isn't computing.  
>> No.  When staff ‑‑ 
>> I see, oh, you don't understand.  You don't even know what I'm talking about.  You're not even speaking my language.  And it's, like, I've had moments where members are escalating and I come at it from, like, more of like a slang perspective.  Like use their terminology, their words relate on like a bro level almost, and it works.  
>> Can you give me an example?  
>> Yeah.  I had a member working with another peer in the community.  We're on the train.  And I was just, like ‑‑ I literally just said, yo, this shit's not cool.  Like we're in public, like that's how you're going to act?  Come on.  And then it was, like, oh.  We are in public.  And we need to chill.  And they went to opposite sides of the train, and it was over.  Talked to both of them after, we went and had a good time.  And after the activity, they were cool, hanging out.  
>> What was that like you for you to have to do that in the moment?  
>> It was fine because I've had to do that before.  It's a lot of, like, again, it's a lot of getting them to mimic and model my behavior.  And it helps me because they do think I'm cool.  That if I say something and I mean it, I'm, like, this isn't, then they're, like, oh.  You know I wear Jordans and I look ‑‑ and they recognize that.  You know, and they say, oh, no, Erin, no.  And I know about different things and I know about life and I get it.  And I have friends who have been in it and I've lost friends to it and I think that brings a level of respect for me, that they'll listen to me.  One of the things they love to say is don't therapyize me, which is not a word.  
[ Laughter ]

>> Google that, everyone.  
>> But they don't ‑‑ you know, in therapy, they might ‑‑ they might be open and they might want that in that hour session with that therapist.  I've noticed a lot of members, they don't want that outside, whether that's in the building, whether that's in the residence, whether it's with me.  You have to be smarter in your approach.  You can get therapy done and to make progress without it feeling like that, and I think that sometimes the members really get offended and it seems like all the time and you're always reaching and you're always trying to, like, understand their pain.  It's, like, they just want to be, like, shut up.  You know?  If I can just be real.  
>> All right.  Pause.  All right.  Kelly?  
>> Hi there.  Thanks to you both for that.  So just a few, as I was noticing a few, you know, some of the comments, there were some questions about kind of your peerness, I guess I would say.  With ‑‑ and this is more less about the supervision, but I guess about, I don't know, a common ‑‑ the role or what people are perceiving as the role and thinking about seeming, like, wondering about why the young people that she's working with were using Miss Erin or Ms. Erin and wondering about that she seemed more ‑‑ less like a peer but more like there was some hierarchy or those ‑‑ 
>> Yeah.  
>> A couple of questions.  
>> They don't see me as a peer because I'm not.  I'm the activity coordinator.  
>> You do use your ‑‑ Erin uses her peer all the time.  
>> That's kind of what people were picking up on.  
>> And it's a different type of peer, like how do I say this?  Like to push back on folks and everyone hear me loud and clear, you can be a peer on many, many, many, many different things.  It does not have to be a hospitalization.  It can be.  But many of our young people are looking for peer relationships of folks who have been successful with work and school despite having struggles, many of our young people in our system have experience in the street complex trauma, and so knowing your population, and that is Erin's population is ‑‑ 
>> Yep.  
>> Young adults, system involved, and she's in a role where she is Captain Engager who uses every ounce of her lived experience in ways that she doesn't even know it.  
>> Yeah.  
>> In order to engage.  
>> Yeah.  They do.  They call me Miss Erin and they respect me and they know ‑‑ they know that.  But at the same time, we go out and we'll have fun and we'll be, you know, Panda Express and we're talking and hanging and it's very colloquial.  Like we just are in it, if you understand what I'm saying.  
>> But your work is also goal driven.  
>> Yeah.  And so it's this interesting balance, right?  So Erin also is writing and the necessity of intervention.  
>> I walk around, hang out.  If that makes sense.  
>> Other questions or thoughts.  
>> At one point, you kind of pivoted to this experience of on the train.  But then moved to something about her colleagues maybe not respecting her and what that was like and wondering about how you kind of made that pivot at that time.  
>> Yeah.  So I, at the beginning of even the entire scenario, jumping right into