Are you looking for an opportunity to use your mental health recovery experience to build community and empower others experiencing mental illness? At Thresholds, we believe in meeting people where they’re at – in their environment and on their journey to recovery. As a Peer Support Specialist, you will foster connection and mutual support in one of Thresholds’ New Freedom Centers. We value personal lived experiences with mental health recovery and are seeking a peer professional, who either has the CRSS (Certified Recovery Support Specialist) credential or is able to get the CRSS within a year.
Thresholds’ New Freedom Centers are operated by peer professionals 7 days a week and create community to aid Thresholds’ clients in their transition to community life after an experience with a group care setting. We offer a range of daily, drop-in activities and programming that include art groups, basic living skills, volunteer opportunities, and holiday parties.
As a Peer Support Specialist, you will welcome clients to the drop-in center and build community through a variety of activities to combat loneliness. You may make and eat lunch together, chat one-on-one, play games, or organize activities. You will teach basic living skills, practice using coping skills, connect visitors to community resources, and develop client empowerment skills through self-advocacy and stigma-busting. You will share your recovery story with our clients in a mutual, two-way helping process where you will learn from each other and model that recovery can happen.
The culture at Thresholds is compassionate and supportive, providing you with the tools and resources you need for the best client care. Opportunities for training and professional development will deepen your knowledge and expand your clinical skills in harm reduction, trauma-informed care, and other evidence-based practices. To support the CRSS credential, we offer free clinical supervision, fee reimbursement, and scholarship opportunities. This invaluable experience will set you up for a variety of career paths and growth opportunities within our organization.
To succeed in this role, you need:
Education and experience:
What sets Thresholds apart:
Thresholds is a mission-driven agency with a deep commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. We foster an environment where all feel valued and respected, a place where every employee can be themselves, thrive, and support the agency’s mission. Click here to learn more.
One of the oldest and largest community mental health organizations in Illinois, we pride ourselves in being a Chicago Tribune Top Workplace and one of Chicago’s 101 Best & Brightest Companies to Work For, several years in a row.
Thresholds provides healthcare, housing, and hope for thousands of persons with mental health and substance use conditions in Illinois each year. Through care, employment, advocacy, and housing, Thresholds assists and inspires people to reclaim their lives.
Thresholds is one of the oldest and largest providers of recovery services for persons with mental health and substance use conditions in Illinois. We offer 30 innovative programs at more than 75 locations throughout Chicago, the adjacent suburbs, and four surrounding counties. Services include assertive outreach, case management, housing, employment, education, psychiatry, primary care, substance use treatment, and research.
Thresholds’ staff meets people where they are – out in the community. Offering services in a community-based setting makes them more accessible and effective and lessens the social exclusion that is often present in the lives of persons living with mental illnesses and substance use conditions. This allows our staff and clients to work on skills, clinical interventions, and recovery that allows them to live independent lives in their own neighborhoods
Our clients are all unique – coming from vastly different backgrounds and arriving with different needs, talents, and hopes. Each client works with our staff to set their own specific short-term goals and objectives, based on their needs, desires, and level of self-sufficiency. Recovery from mental illnesses and substance use is possible. Recovery is a process of finding and living a satisfying and meaningful life, as one defines it for oneself. We assist our clients as they work to reclaim a positive sense of self, and discover their own potential, gifts, and skills.
