Mental Health Association of San Francisco

Training Institute

Evidence-based trainings designed to enhance skills and knowledge for professional development within a cooperative learning environment.

What we do

We deliver engaging, interactive trainings and workshops discussing an array of mental health topics for people of any profession and level of familiarity.

National Peer Specialist Certification Training

A 40 hour classroom training program approved by Mental Health America as a National Certification Program for Peer Specialists. Learn evidence-based peer specialist techniques and tools developed in partnership with peers, clinicians, and individuals with lived-experience.

Schedule

Participants will meet twice a week for six weeks.

Important update

Enrollment will be sorted into only one cohort moving forward. The only remaining spots will meet Thursdays and Saturdays for the duration of the 6-week course

“The content in this training was actionable, rooted in research, and clear. I felt engaged the entire time.”

-Training Institute Alum

Topics

Self-care and community care

Focus: Self-care strategies for preventing and dealing with
compassion fatigue, burnout, and vicarious trauma

Learn: Specific aspects of compassion fatigue, vicarious trauma, and burnout, as well as ways to assess and address them

Practice: Concrete steps to incorporate self-care into one’s daily routine to better sustain one’s experience, community, and work

Supportive Crisis Response

Focus: Crisis, distress, and one’s response to them, while minimizing the need to involve law enforcement

Learn: Compassionate, humane, and effective methods of addressing anger, fear, grief, etc.

Practice: Effective responses to the crises of community members, staff, or visitors to one’s organization

Supporting People with Cluttering (Hoarding) Challenges

Focus: The definitions and features of Hoarding Disorder

Learn: The impacts of stigma

Practice: Effective strategies to support individuals experiencing Hoarding/Cluttering challenges

Workplace Allyship

Focus: Allyship as it relates to a supportive work environment; privilege, power, and intersectionality

Learn: Specific traits of supportive allyship for one’s community

Practice: The concrete steps to support team members with diverse identities, and develop strategies around addressing workplace diversity concerns if/when needed

Managing Boundaries

Focus: The distinction between people who are vulnerable to boundary setting and those who benefit from maintaining boundaries; how to best communicate boundary setting for all parties involved

Learn: The different types of boundaries and how to identify them

Practice: techniques for setting appropriate boundaries within community relationships and settings

Introduction to Motivational Interviewing for Non-Clinicians

Focus: How to channel and convey one’s belief in recovery, empowerment, and personal choice

Learn: Classic Motivational Interviewing techniques

Practice: Strategies that promote person-driven changes and positive outcomes for all parties involved

Language Matters

Focus: How to create an environment that promotes recovery and wellness by understanding how language is used

Learn: How to take an integrative, person0centered approach to language

Practice: The necessary tools one needs to integrate the power of language in a valuable manner

Healing-Centered Engagement

Focus: Explore the connection between trauma, mental health, and recovery

Learn: What trauma is and why its effects have such an impact

Practice: Healing-centered engagement through group discussions of multiple trauma-informed scenarios

Wellness Recovery Action Plan (WRAP ®)

Focus: How to decrease and prevent intrusive or troubling feelings and behaviors, increase personal empowerment, improve quality of life, and achieve one’s personal life goals

Learn: How to create tools and techniques individuals can or already use as a crisis plan

Practice: Recognizing the wisdom that already exists in one’s experience

WRAP® Co-Facilitator Certification Training

For anyone who has completed a Seminar 1 Wrap workshop and has incorporated WRAP into their personal lives

Focus: A 5-day intensive certification course co-facilitated by Certified Advanced Level WRAP® facilitators

Learn: How to use the WRAP® facilitator manual to facilitate WRAP®

Mental Health/Illnes 101

Focus: Mental health recovery, with an emphasis on the possibility for individuals experiencing mental health challenges to define and experience their own recovery journey

Learn: Prevalent mental health condition features and risk factors, as well as the impacts of mental health stigma

Practice: Supporting individuals in defining/experiencing their own recovery journey

Additional Training Details

Trainings Schedule

Each training topic is taught in a 90-minute session. Topics can be combined for a 3-hour, half-day or a 6-hour, full-day format.

Trainings Pricing
Please contact our training manager (trainings@mentalhealthsf.org) for all training rates and pricing.
COVID-19 Update

Each training topic is taught in a 90-minute session. Topics can be combined for a 3-hour, half-day or a 6-hour, full-day format.

Learn More
For additional information pertaining to the Training Institute, contact Sabrina Mahoney at trainings@mentalhealthsf.org.
Training Institute Trainers

CW Johnson

Terri Byrne

Sabrina Mahoney