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Peer Academy

We believe people grow through shared stories and mutual support. Peer Academy offers a welcoming learning environment to deepen your understanding of peer support and build skills rooted in lived experience. Our training emphasizes connection and compassion, preparing future peer supporters to show up authentically, honor each person’s journey, and foster environments where dignity and respect are at the center of every interaction.
What We Do
What We Offer
Who We Support
Core Values
How It Began
FAQs
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What is Peer Academy?

 Peer Academy is an intense and rigorous professional development course that includes pre-academy coursework, homework, class exercises and sharing your recovery story in class.

Peer Academy is the culmination of years of experience from international peer experts who, in addition to serving as peer specialists, have started up, developed and currently operate successful peer organizations and programs. Acceptance into Peer Academy is competitive, therefore an application and interview process for those that are well-grounded in their own recovery who are committed to excelling as a peer specialist should apply. 

What We Offer

What Peer Academy Offers?

Peer Academy is a North Carolina Certified Peer Support Specialist Program (NCCPSS) Approved Course and provides fifty-hours of credit toward the required training hours for certification. The developers and facilitators of Peer Academy are skilled and are committed to sharing their expertise in building a competent, qualified peer workforce as an investment in developing future leaders in the peer movement. 

Our curriculum introduces foundational peer support values, communication skills, cultural humility, trauma awareness, and wellness practices. Through group discussions, experiential activities, and guided reflection, participants gain confidence in supporting others while maintaining healthy boundaries and honoring shared experience. We also offer connection to ongoing learning opportunities within PRN’s broader peer network.

Who We Support

Who does Peer Academy support?

Peer Academy supports people who are interested in becoming peer supporters or deepening their understanding of peer-led work. Whether someone is new to the field or exploring how to use their lived experience to support others, our program welcomes anyone who is willing to learn, grow, and show up authentically. No prior experience is required.

Our Core Values

What are the core values of Peer Academy?

Peer Academy is grounded in authenticity, shared experience, mutual respect, and personal empowerment. We value storytelling, compassion, self-determination, and the belief that every person’s lived experience carries wisdom. Our training honors the heart of the peer movement: connection, dignity, community care, and the understanding that healing grows through relationships rooted in equality and trust.

How it Began

How did Peer Support begin?

Mutual peer support was born out of the Consumer/Survivor/Ex-Patient Movement of the 1960’s. At that time, people begun realizing not only that recovery is possible but that it is greatly enhanced by sharing our own recovery experiences with each other. Since that time, peer support has evolved into a professional role within the behavioral health system that maintains the core essence of ‘being with’, in mutuality, to support others to find their OWN personal greatness.

It is this very mutuality makes peer support effective. Mutuality ensures that we are supporting people to find their OWN power, voice and path, and are not serving as an expert, parent, monitor, counselor or any other authority in the person’s life. While it is true that effective peer support requires the skilled use of your own lived experience to inspire others, it is also true that the profession is complex, requiring peer workers to support people in new ways while challenging systems to shift toward recovery an maintaining the uniqueness of working in the system while not being of the system’s culture.

Being effective in this role therefore requires a competency-based education that combines knowledge, skills, experience, exposure and tools.

Frequently Asked Questions

FAQs

No. Anyone with an interest and a willingness to learn is welcome.
Yes. Participants receive documentation upon completion of the core training.
Acceptance into Peer Academy is competitive and requires an application and interview process. The course is for those that are well-grounded in their own recovery and who are committed to excelling as a peer specialist.
 
The cost to attend Peer Academy is $375. To apply, please click the apply now button located at the bottom of this page.

Once you are accepted into the program you will be sent a link to register and pay the fee.

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What makes Peer Academy different?

Peer Academy stands out because it is designed and delivered by people with lived experience. Our interactive, relational approach is rooted in the values of peer movement. Unlike traditional learning models, we create a welcoming setting where learning happens through connection, story-sharing, and practice. Our focus on building confidence, community, and clarity prepares people to support others with empathy, authenticity, and respect.

Want to become a Peer Support Specialist?

Apply to join one of our Peer Academy sessions

Apply Now