November 25, 2022- Hong Fook’s Culturally Competent Recovery College team received the Team Achievement Award from the Bhayana Family Foundation through the United Way Greater Toronto.
The United Way Greater Toronto presented the 2022 Greater Toronto Bhayana Family Foundation individual and team awards through a hybrid ceremony on Nov 25. Hong Fook’s Culturally Competent Recovery College received the Team Achievement Award. Our Culturally Competent Recovery College is the first of its kind in Canada to adapt the innovative Recovery College model in a culturally appropriate, language-specific way. The blend of personal and professional experience in mental health underpins the work of this team, consisting of mental health workers, management and support staff, and a range of peer positions for individuals with lived experience, including peer coach, peer supporter workers and peer supporters.
Since the launch of this College in 2019 and throughout the pandemic, the team have collaboratively realigned their work and efforts to this service model with a better focus on empowering peers to lead their recovery lives and contributing to others’ recovery journey, while compassionately taking care of each other to cope with their own burnout and COVID fatigue faced by the significantly increasing community demands and long wait time for clinical services. The well-trained 20+ peer supporters are valuable asset, which not only reduces the perceived power imbalances between staff and clients that are often found in mental health service delivery, but also addresses the workplace retention and recruitment issues, especially to staff serving racialized communities that are required to understand the community and those being served.