Peer Support Specialist Youth

Brief Description

The Harris Center for Mental Health and IDD ("The HARRIS CENTER") is looking for a Peer Support Specialist Youth to join our team. The Youth Peer Support Specialist (YPSS) provides youth‑driven services for young people, increases youth engagement, and expands capacity for youth voice across the agency and community. This position draws on their own lived experience navigating behavioral health systems to inspire hope and model relationships built on respect, trust, and validation.

By sharing their own lived experience, the Youth Peer Support Specialist helps youth to enhance wellness, create strategies for self‑empowerment, and take concrete steps towards building fulfilling, self‑determined lives for themselves. The position serves as an ally and advocate for young people and promotes connection, builds rapport, and inspires hope. The responsibilities of this position may frequently require travel across the community and work inside the family home, schools, and other community settings.

• Provides support to youth who choose to engage with the youth peer support specialist.
• Develops authentic, meaningful relationships with individuals and families through empathy, sharing experiences, listening, and collaborating with genuine curiosity and interest.
• Identify and actively share information about community resources that are available to youth.
• Assist and support youth to identify and build community and natural supports.
• Promote self‑advocacy by assisting youth in articulating their personal goals and desires.
• Support the team and agency in collaborating with and engaging youth.
• Maintain open and frequent communication with the team, including reporting safety and other concerns to the team.
• Participate in regularly scheduled supervision.
• Collaborate with the team to ensure that services and agency culture are youth‑driven, youth‑friendly, culturally and linguistically competent, trauma‑informed, and responsive to the needs of the youth who are served.
• Educate the youth and family members so they may understand and recognize mental health symptoms, different treatment options and assist with referring to community resources.
• Completes electronic documentation each workday which becomes part of the medical record for the Agency.
• Follows the key principles of a trauma informed approach (i.e. safety, trustworthiness and transparency, peer support, collaboration and mutuality, empowerment, voice and choice, cultural, historical, and gender issues) when interacting with the community and colleagues.
• Performs related work as assigned and adapts to changing work requirements.
• Demonstrates ethical conduct in all professional activities.
• Complies with Agency policies and procedures.
• Provide assistance to the Agency and staff as requested and required.

• High School Diploma or general education degree (GED).
• If not certified as a Peer Specialist, certification must be obtained within 90 days of employment.

• Must self‑identify as a user of Mental Health Services with no crisis services utilized within a year, and no hospitalization within a year. May consider one stay within a year if it was a short duration.
• Must have at least a 12 months treatment history of one of the severe and persistent mental illnesses.
• Background check is required.
• Preferred experience effectively collaborating and advocating alongside youth.

• Valid Texas Driver’s License required.

• Have personal lived experience navigating behavioral health systems and juvenile justice system. Demonstrate strong interpersonal communications skills and the ability to empathize, with, relate to and effectively collaborate with youth and team members. Demonstrate a strong understanding of boundaries and principles of self‑care. Have the willingness to disclose their lived experience, where appropriate, for the purpose of empowerment. Basic understanding of mental illness, common signs, symptoms, and the ability to identify difficulties coping in community settings.
  
  Bi‑lingual is a strong plus. Group affiliations a strong plus; i.e., NAMI, DBSA, AA, NA, etc.
• Must have…