New course empowers VCU students to support their peers’ recovery

By Sian Wilkerson

Like many students during COVID-19, Avery Eisenhower's high school experience was anything but traditional. Stuck at home and staring down the monotony of days making up her new normal, Eisenhower began to turn to new thrills - "smoking weed … drinking," she said. "And it picked up really fast."

By the time she graduated from high school, Eisenhower was struggling with her mental health. And when she took a full-time job at a restaurant, her struggles only grew. "It just kind of snowballed," she said. "I got really bad with the drugs and addiction and alcoholism."

Luckily, there were people in Eisenhower's corner who helped her find her way to recovery. Now a social work student at Virginia Commonwealth University, where she just finished her freshman year, Eisenhower's mission is to help others attempting to navigate the same path.

This past semester, Eisenhower was one of four students enrolled in the inaugural peer recovery specialist course at VCU.

With support from a five-year grant from the Virginia Opioid Abatement Authority, the course was developed by faculty and staff with Rams in Recovery, the School of Social Work and the Institute for Research on Behavioral and Emotional Health to prepare students for state certification.

Offered as a cross-listed elective open to all majors, the course is geared toward individuals with lived experience in mental health or substance use recovery, and was built out of a state-run, 72-hour training, utilizing Virginia's state-approved peer recovery specialist curriculum. It is application-based, and approval is required to enroll. Social work students can enroll under SLWK 391, if they are undergraduates, or SLWK 791, if they are in the master's program, while students from other disciplines may participate through the appropriate cross-listed course designation.

For years, the course's instructor Lauren de Treville Powell, Ed.D., has taught future certified peer recovery specialists in the community. As a person in recovery herself, she knows how impactful such people can be.

"The difference it makes when you have at least one person in your life who truly believes in you and truly wants to support you, that is life-changing," said Powell, assistant director of academic recovery initiatives. "I feel like everyone needs someone like that."

Throughout the spring, Powell and her students - including Eisenhower, psychology majors Angeline Lopez and Leah Byron, and Kim Longbricco, a double-major in psychology and social work - met twice a week for classes and skills labs required by the state.

In one lab, the students shared their stories, part of the process of "recovering out loud" - a key tenet of the peer recovery model.

Talking about their experiences "could potentially help someone or inspire them to seek the assistance or help or support that they need, and I think that's very much what recovering out loud is," Longbricco said. "If you go up and talk a little bit about your story, it could really inspire [someone] and help them develop a network of support, and I think that's a beautiful concept."

While people often associate recovery with substance use, the course's focus is broader: "Recovery is so individual," Powell said. "The course covers both substance use disorder and a spectrum of mental illness or mental health challenges."

The skills taught in the course - motivational interviewing, ethical decision-making - are ones that students can take with them throughout their lives, regardless of where their journey takes them.

"The ways we're learning how to support people aren't necessarily just applicable to being in recovery," Longbricco said. "It's applicable to a lot more aspects of life than people realize, whether it's something as simple as being there for a friend who may be going through something or helping a family member."

With the first semester of the course in the books, Eisenhower, an aspiring therapist, is eager to see how it will grow, and how it can help create a culture where people aren't afraid to share their stories.

"I tell people: 'Don't be afraid to ask,'" she said. "I'm not ashamed of my past or anything, and I think that talking about it brings more light to the fact that recovery is possible."

As someone in recovery, she knows firsthand the courage it takes to open up, even in front of a room of peers who have walked a similar path. But she also knows it's worth it: "Getting into a community and being able to have the courage to share my story has made my recovery all the better."