Join us on Zoom for the launch of Synergi’s Peer Networking Space

Held online monthly, on the second Tuesday in the month, we’re hosting a supportive space for people with lived experience of racism to enable compassionate peer support and networking opportunities, to build community and to connect with others doing work in this area.

Facilitated by Jess (she/they) and Alaina (she/her), we invite Black People and people of colour doing user-led group or campaigning work, at the intersection of racial justice and mental health, distress and/or trauma, to join us for these sessions. Sharing with others is a way to build resource and collective power to make change. We know that staff at Synergi are not the experts, and that it is together as a network that we hold far greater information and wisdom.

In the first session we’ll be having conversations around what we want from the groups, and collaboratively we’ll set a list of community intentions. Though the topics of conversation will be led by the group, we expect some of the areas below to come up:

• Help and direction from peers to resources to support how your group is run e.g. setting up policies and procedures;
• Thoughts around the pros and cons of being an un-constituted group;
• Sharing our experiences and helpful coping tips when doing racial justice work in a hostile environment;
• The pros and cons of having lived experience of the issues we work with;
• Sharing ideas to overcome the challenges of sustainability and creating care within the work;
• How we practice abolitionist mental health care in our communities;
• How the hardship of the work can be offset with joy.

Each group will be 90 minutes long, with a break roughly halfway through with maximum capacity for each group set at 20 people. We may hold smaller breakout rooms if it seems supportive.

To keep the space feeling comfy enough to discuss big topics, please have a look at our online events procedure. We’ll also return to our community intentions at the beginning of each group. If people breach this agreement, we will remove them, so as to maintain as safe a space as possible.

We know the work is tough and lateness can be a reflection of this, however to keep the facilitators and members feeling grounded in the session, 10 minutes after the group begins at 14:30, the group will be closed to latecomers.

We will check in over a few groups about how the space is feeling. We welcome feedback, and really want to make this a space that is co-created and works for our community 😊

To book a place in the first session, please follow this Zoom registration link We expect a full group, so please, if you can no longer make it, cancel your place as soon as possible so someone else can take your space.

If you have any questions, or would like to touch base before joining us, please email synergi.info@nsun.org.uk