The following piece was guest written by Tim Jurney ’15 with the help of Olivia Grabar Sage ’15. The Peer Counselors were founded during the summer preceding the 2012-2013 academic year out of a desire to provide resources and outlets for students dealing with mental health issues. In the past year, we have evolved enormously, and continue to evolve to meet the needs of the student body as best we can. Please always feel free to e-mail peercounselors@kenyon.edu with questions/comments/suggestions. Our hotline number is 740-398-3806. 

Asked to define the Peer Counselors, I’m always a little intimidated. In the course of only a year we’ve grown to mean a lot of different things on campus. But at its most basic, the PCs exist to give Kenyon students peer resources for anything that we think they might need. We’re a new and ever-evolving group; the Peer Counselors understand that everyone’s dealing with their own stuff, and sometimes we need some help, or a patient ear. Anytime you feel lost or hurt or simply in need of a friend, hit us up.

The Peer Counselors are trained with the help of the Counseling Center to cover a broad spectrum of issues that students may face in their lives and during their time at Kenyon. To give you all an idea of some of the ways that we try to reach out to the campus, and be a resource for student, I’ve decided to explain the PCs in the form of a commercial advertisement. Feel free to read the following in your cheesiest announcer voice:

If you need to talk but don’t necessarily need the counseling center or a close friend, the PCs practice confidentiality, are happy to talk to you one-on-one, and our posters (with our names and phone numbers) will be all over campus within a week. Freaking out and don’t know what to do? Call our 24-hour PC Hotline. Want to hang in a safe space, do homework, chat with some caring peers who are here to listen? Our house is open and staffed with 2 PCs every day from 6-10PM. Feel like you’re the only one dealing with something really tough? Check out our peer discussion groups, where students get together to talk about issues they’re all facing.  Want to see great concerts, appreciate powerful art, or dance your stress away? Our all-campus events are all of these things and more. Feel like there’s something the campus should be discussing more? We host Dessert and Discussions all the time.