An episode of Changing the Conversation podcast
Johanna Bergan and Gina Albano discuss the history and current status of youth peer support with host Rowan Willis-Gorman. This episode is part of a series featuring youth peer workers and recovery innovators discussing how to improve and uplift behavioral health systems for youth.
November 17, 2025
[Music]
Rowan Willis-Gorman, Host (00:05):
Hello and welcome to Changing the Conversation. I’m your host, Rowan Willis-Gorman, I’m a subject matter expert and manager at C4 Innovations within our Center for Youth Well-Being. Today’s conversation is part of a podcast series called The Next Generation of Recovery Leaders, where together we’ll learn from youth peer workers and recovery innovators about how they’re utilizing creativity, grassroots organizing, and determination to uplift a behavioral health system for them. Through conversation and reflective storytelling we’ll explore the current landscape of youth and young adult recovery systems across the country, discuss how innovative youth voices have impacted those systems, and how harmful legislation is being met with passionate young advocates pushing towards a brighter future.
(00:52):
Our aim is to uplift and recognize the vibrant youth leaders across the country, and to inspire the next generation of advocates. In part one of this two-part conversation, we spoke about the history of the youth movement and the journey that’s led us to today. And today, we’ll talk about the current state of the youth peer support workforce, and the bright future ahead of us. Today, I’m joined again by Gina Albano and Johanna Bergan. Gina is calling in today from Haverhill, Massachusetts, and she is a Lead Youth Wellness Coach at C4 Innovations. Hi Gina.
Gina Albano, Guest (01:27): Hey Rowan. Thank you, I’m happy to be here and excited to continue the conversation.
Rowan (01:31): Johanna is calling in from Connecticut, where she is a program manager at the Innovations Institute at the University of Connecticut. Hi, Johanna, it’s great to have you back.
Johanna Bergan, Guest (01:42): Glad to be here, and excited to continue to talk about youth advocacy and youth peer support.
Rowan (01:47): It’s so wonderful to have you both back with us after our amazing conversation last time. I wanted to dive right in. Gina, last time you spoke about your role as a Youth Wellness Coach in schools in Massachusetts, what supports you to do your best work in the schools?
Gina (02:09): Having an understanding of my role and what it is that I do is really important. I think with it being a newer type of role, it can be really confusing. I know my friends always joke, “What does Gina do? Nobody knows.” Because it’s something that a lot of people have never heard about. So, I think the first step is generating that understanding of what my role is, and why it’s important, and then to follow that up generating buy-in from specifically school staff and the people who work around me to recognize the work that I’m doing as important and see the value in it. And so, having a really strong school champion or person that you’re working under can support you in what you need in order to be successful can really help create a good environment for me to actually be able to connect with students and get really hands-on into the work that I want to be doing.
Rowan (03:19): Definitely Gina. And I want to just validate the fact that I don’t think that any of my friends could describe my job currently, so that is not something that goes away. And I just want to brag about Gina just for a minute. You have done such an amazing job of describing your role, and not getting frustrated when you do have people that struggle to understand it, and it’s amazing to watch, because I can remember being, when I first started working in the field, I was 19, and getting so agitated when people could not understand the work that I was doing.
(04:06):
So, I’m always impressed by the grace that you bring into the work. And Gina, I know from being one of the supporters on this project, and being your supervisor, that there are challenges that kind of pop up in doing this work, and some of them I think are anticipated, like you talked about, of someone not understanding the work, and some of them are so niche and specific that we never anticipated gaining access to systems. But what are some specific challenges that you’ve noticed that you want to talk about?
Gina (04:43): Yeah, I think there’s a lot of challenges that are anticipated that come with being a non-clinician working in the Behavioral Health field, especially with buy-in. We know not everyone is going to buy into it, that’s just something you learn along the way. But there’s also little things that are surprising, like you mentioned getting access to systems and getting space has been a really big thing, I think it’s very hard to do my role without having a confidential space to talk with students, and especially in schools, space is a very hard thing to come by. So, that’s been an unexpected challenge that we’ve had to roll with and figure out the different ways to address it so that I can still be successful in my work while dealing with these little niche issues that were definitely not anticipated.
Rowan (05:46): 1000%. And you’ve done such an amazing job of navigating those issues in two very different schools that have different needs and different challenges. Johanna, I’m wondering, as you’re listening to this, as you’ve watched the field grow and change, is there any wisdom or insight that comes to mind that you might want to share?
Johanna (06:21): Thanks, Gina, for your vulnerability and being honest that the work of peer support is really great and fulfilling, and also full of challenges, that flexibility and adaptability is an unnamed prerequisite to our youth peer roles. What’s coming to mind for me is that over the last 10 years or so, as youth peer support has expanded, some of the things that you’re sharing as positive supports, that help you be effective in your role, or challenges that you still have to navigate every day are things that we anticipated, and like you said, some of them have emerged more recently, particularly as we see youth peers expand their roles, working in different systems, working in different spaces, and that’s really exciting. So, trying to strength-based reframe the challenges to say that that’s actually a part of the growth and the expansion of youth peer.
(07:20):
I would just echo and share my affinity for a couple of those challenges in a way that hopefully helps those listening to our conversation think about the role they can play in supporting youth peers in their communities. One is this idea of role clarity. If you have any thought in your mind of “What does a youth peer actually do, or what would their value be?” Seek out youth peers and ask them to share what their work looks like. The role clarity is complicated because youth peers are being hired into a professional traditional helping system, and as you said, Gina, it’s a non-clinical support.
(08:05):
So, there are other examples of supports and services we offer that can sometimes help people understand, oh, this is more like therapeutic mentoring than it is about outpatient therapy. And yet there’s still this uniqueness to youth peers around having lived experience navigating the same systems that the young people being supported have or are navigating, and this near-peer age dynamic. So, we have a generational connection to how we operate in the world. So, clarity around that is huge and totally needed, and I think we all have a part in getting curious about feeling firm about that role and our understanding, and then also helping to message and champion so that youth peers don’t have to show up in every room, and the first thing they do is justify who they are, what they do, and why they deserve to be there.
(09:04):
The second is having champions, right? So, Gina, you named it, it works better when there’s a supporter in a different role, in your school, who speaks up for you and on behalf of you, and is excited that you’re there and sees the value. And so, huge opportunity, particularly for many of us in the adult recovery leadership space to do some more of that, and then the third is support. And I think about this in a lot of ways, but making sure that youth peers as individuals have their support systems that are super strong around them, like you talk about your friends, and we know that’s super key for you to live your best well life while doing this work.
(09:47):
That support also needs to come within the organizations that youth peers are working in, sometimes youth peers are hired by the organization that they work in, sometimes they’re hired by another organization and come in and provide services. You need support to do your work logistically and emotionally in both of those spaces. And then, this idea of a youth movement is really important because it helps youth peers center themselves in a larger body of work, that most professionals experience in some realm. I can see other people who do work like me and youth peers need that too.
Rowan (10:29): Thank you, Johanna. It’s wild to recognize the similarities and common threads that still exist. I think when I started the work, I had those champions and I learned how important they are, and it’s amazing to realize that that knowledge that we gained during the work is being directly implemented, when we started the project, the PCORI project that Gina works under, that was one of the first things we identified is these coaches will need a champion to support and uplift them in the schools that they’re in. I’m wondering for both of you with the historical conversation we had last time, and the very present-based conversation we just had, when you look forward, what do you hope to see in our field?
Johanna (11:22): I’d love to share the learnings and maybe the mistakes that we’ve made in the past so that this generation of youth peers and youth advocates can pick up and run much further forward with them, and when I think about the biggest gifts I wish I had given, and so now try to think about how I can give to our upcoming youth advocates who hopefully will become youth peer providers, is that we didn’t necessarily have a great model of recovery elders teaching us the way, and sharing, “We tried that, it didn’t work, here’s why we’re doing it this way.” And there were cultural, intergenerational, and world events that caused that lesson sharing, story sharing to be more difficult, and there’s still time to do it. And so, I want to be a part of sharing what we’ve learned and how we’ve learned it, in order to help youth peers really push forward into frontiers that we haven’t imagined again.
(12:35):
I also, a big part of my youth movement experience was having to learn how to pass the torch. So, I remind all organizations that I work with that the sustainability challenges for any movement or organization are standard, we’ve all got a set, and if you’re doing youth work, you have to also manage the additional sustainability challenge that we are aging out of our roles every day. So, that emphasis or that need to cultivate and build the bench and transfer authority and responsibility to learn is so much heavier within a youth peer organization or a youth movement space. I didn’t have a model for that, and so I tried to lead to the best that I knew how to offer a pathway for youth leaders to give away leadership roles to the next generation, I didn’t do it perfectly, and I hope that I can share my learning so that whoever has to try it next can do it more gracefully.
(13:45):
And so, that’s both a thing I wish we had done and a gift that I’d like to offer to the future. And then, the third thing is a message to all the youth peers out there. I was among many youth advocates who struggled to trust adults, systems, potential employers, because the system had not taught us how to trust, it had taught us how to distrust. Unfortunately, that meant we often said no to help because we were worried that there was a catch, or it was not going to turn out in our best interest, or maybe the person offering or the organization offering or the funder offering wanted something for themselves more than they wanted to see us succeed.
(14:29):
And I understand why we couldn’t trust. On the other side, as someone at an organization who has resources to offer to the youth peer movement, I realized that there’s a lot of us on this side that truly just want to help, and don’t have any hidden agenda or hope, and so I hope that we can all get better at really authentic conversation and dialogue to build that trust so that there can be more investment in the youth peer movement to move forward.
Gina (15:03): For me, I think having this conversation with you, Johanna and Rowan as well, and you both sharing your expertise and the experience that you’ve had, it really creates this comfortability I think, just having the conversation with what a youth peer is. And I think that is such a key aspect of growing this workforce, is to start getting comfortable with it, and I am so grateful to be able to be in a space with both of you, that make me feel seen in my role and have a better understanding of my role. And so, to me, I think this conversation is a huge help to looking towards the future and what we need to do in order to get comfortable with youth peers, and I hope in the future that I’m able to be someone like both of you that can share my experience to younger people in this workforce and what worked and what didn’t work, and hopefully there won’t be too much of the same, but if there is, we’ll have that experience to deal with it and work through it.
Rowan (16:25): Thank you both so much for those incredibly thoughtful answers with the growth and the hope of looking forward, and I want to tie them together just a little bit and build off of them. Johanna, I hear that thought of sustainability and that concept of generation next, and it can be so scary to leave something that has been such a large part of your life. I know when I left my youth peer role at On Our Own of Maryland, I was both excited and terrified to leave something that I had helped build, but I worked so hard to support and build up a team of youth mentors and youth advocates across the state that it didn’t truly feel like leaving, it just felt like I was passing off the torch to someone that at that point had a different vision than I did, and that felt good to breathe new life into something that I cared so much about.
(17:35):
And with the growth of this workforce, I think there’s always this, Johanna, you talked about support and resources, and so much of that is around what funding exists, but also about what unique takes exist, and I think the project that Gina and I are currently working on, when we started, it was such a unique take to bring youth peers into SBIRT (Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment) screening was something that I had never considered. And to see where we are now, to see that growth, this possibility, this not only creating youth peer roles across the state of Massachusetts, but also creating that positive impact on young people, which is the true purpose of all of this, was phenomenal.
(18:33):
So, I hope that as people, whether they be youth advocates or advocates for youth, when they look forward into the future, I hope that they think creatively and don’t just stick to the mindset of “These are where youth peers are now, this is where they must stay.” If I’ve learned anything in the past 12 years, and if I’ve learned anything in working with Gina, it’s that this can all change. This can all grow, and what is happening right now is not the best, there is always better to look forward to. And that brings me so much hope.
(19:18):
I want to thank you both so much for joining us today. Gina, thank you so much for your time and your wisdom and sharing it with us.
Gina (19:27): Thank you, Rowan, and I’m grateful for both of you, for all the work you’ve done, and happy to be included on this conversation.
Rowan (19:35): And Johanna, as always, thank you so much for your wisdom and perspective and just being such a fun person to chat with.
Johanna (19:46): Thanks so much Rowan and Gina, it’s a pleasure to talk, and looking forward to all that is to come for youth peers in the future.
Rowan (19:54): And to our listeners, join us next time on Changing the Conversation.
Erika Simon, Producer (19:59): Visit C4innovates.com and follow us on LinkedIn and YouTube for more resources to grow your impact. Thank you for joining us, this episode was produced by Erika Simon and Christina Murphy. Our theme song was written and performed by Peter Hanlon. Join us next time on Changing the Conversation.
Listen to other episodes in the Next Generation Recovery Leaders series.