Project LETS at Penn
Project LETS at Penn provides one-on-one, long-term peer support and advocacy services with our
Peer Mental Health Advocate
(PMHA) Program
Our core idea is simple:Â people who have lived experience with mental illness can offer a specific, unique, culturally and socially relevant, and accessible type of mental health care-- known as peer support.
What is the PMHA program?
Peer Mental Health Advocates (PMHAs) are college students with lived experiences of mental illness, trained to provide confidential and free peer counseling and advocacy services. PMHAs provide assistance with daily management, social and emotional support, coping skills, linkage to clinical and community resources, and crisis services.
According to Mental Health America, "Peer supporters are people who use their experience of recovery from mental health disorders to support others in recovery. Combined with skills often learned in formal training, their experience and institutional knowledge put them in a unique position to offer support." For Project LETS, we use a slightly different model. Peer supporters are not only people who use their experiences of recovery and healing to help others in recovery--peer support means using experiences of mental illness to support others who are struggling or in need of support. For many folks with mental illness, these experiences are lifelong.
Project LETS believes there is no better support than from those who can empathize with you. Peer Mental Health Advocates (PMHA) understand pain, have experience with mental illness, and can offer insight, education, and skills to folks unable or unwilling to access professionalized help. We also work with folks who are in need of additional support, even though they may have a therapist or psychiatrist. This form of integrated healthcare/peer support is remarkably successful, as connectedness and relationships among isolated, disconnected folks are among the best forms of help one can provide.
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Learn more here
Program Benefits
Personalized, one-on-one support
Available when clinical care isn't
Opportunity to build a community & coping skills
Equal partnership (transparency)​
Confidential (sexual assault, self-harm, suicide)
Assistance navigating clinical care
Free advocacy services
Crisis support
Working with a PMHA
You'll work with your PMHA to plan a meeting schedule that is convenient. Â Most pairs meet once or twice a week and communicate when they are not meeting in person. Â PMHAs work in partnership with peers to determine session structure, goals, and how to best provide support.
Requesting a PMHA
The process is simple, and you can also anonymously refer a peer to the PMHA program! You don't need a diagnosis to work with a PMHA. You have the ability to choose your own PMHA based on what identities and experiences are important you--race, gender, sexuality, or diagnosis.
To request a PMHA from Project LETS at Penn, please fill out this form.
You can learn about our PMHAs here.
Interested in becoming a PMHA?
We train PMHAs every semester! If you're interested in becoming a PMHA, please email upenn.lets@gmail.com to enroll in a training program. We also distribute PMHA applications at the start of every semester on our Facebook Page, so be sure to keep an eye out for that!