Peer-led Outreach
The framework behind everything we do
Activities are the entry point, not the end point
In the Peer Partnership for Change framework, activities are often the entry point for peer engagements. Activities create the conditions for people who use drugs to name the issues affecting their lives, explore those issues in context, and begin developing a collective analysis.
Activities may be used throughout the entire process, not just to identify issues but to revisit them, refine understanding, and build the skills and analysis needed for collective decision-making and structural change. What matters is that activities are linked to the identification of issues, not detached from them.
From engagement to structural change
Meet people where they are
Outreach, advocacy and group work open up the space for people to name what is actually happening in their lives, in their own words.
Build a collective analysis
Group settings let people examine those issues in context, look at relatable evidence, and design solutions rather than receive them.
Create decision-making structures
Peers move into advisory boards and working groups where they direct processes and hold influence, rather than feeding back into someone else’s system.
What the framework delivered
Why it has to be peer-led and independent
UISCE being independent of any service or structure is vital to this work. It puts us in a position to help facilitate the space for peers to develop analysis, challenge systems and drive change on their own terms.
Peer-led spaces that are independent of existing services but linked in with them allow everyone to work together on the change all sides agree needs to happen. Partnerships are vital to that process, and independence gives us the space and the tools to create the conditions for it.
Research with Trinity College Dublin makes the same case: moving beyond tokenism means peers are given real power to influence policy and services, not simply invited to comment on decisions already taken.
People who use drugs never get to see behind the scenes. It is powerful to have peers go in and play a key role, and to show what happens when peers are supported to lead.
Peer Support Worker, UISCE
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Whether you are a peer, a service, or a policymaker, we would be glad to talk about what this looks like in practice.