Peer Counselling 2017

As part of its efforts to contribute to the reduction of the rate of adolescent pregnancy in Jamaica, the Women's Centre of Jamaica Foundation has been training in-school youths to serve as peer counsellors in their schools for the past 25 years. Peer Counsellors will then help their peers to cope with, and find solutions for, the wide range of issues with which they are confronted.

The two-week training exercise targets high school students within the 14 – 17 age group. Facilitators from Civil Society and other Government Department and Agencies serve as facilitators for the sessions which cover a wide range of subject matter. At the end of the sessions, the students each receive a certificate of completion and a peer counsellors’ button.

The list of students who complete the training is sent to the respective schools who formally introduce the students to the school community at the beginning of the school year. Over the years, the Peer Counsellors training exercise had been delivered only at the Kingston Centre. However, in 2014, the decision was taken to widen the scope of this activity, and increase its impact, by incrementally delivering the training at additional centres.