The Journal

Issue date: 11/16/06 Section: News

Media Credit: Ashley Gieseking Sparkling grape juice "mocktails" are served during Campus Activities' "A Night in Vegas" Nov. 9.

Peer Education Zeitgeist is not here to tell students what to do, said Alexis Graves, a junior psychology major and month-long member of the group.

Instead, PEZ presents itself as an alternative to talking to counselors, Graves said. Rather than emphasizing any particular area - such as drug abuse - the organization offers advice on how to live a healthy lifestyle in general.

"We're mostly here to listen," Graves said.

PEZ, a student organization under the direction of Counseling and Life Development, was founded more than a decade ago. Gladys Smith, adviser for the organization and the assistant director of counseling, translates the German word zeitgeist as "a new beginning." She stressed the educator part of the PEZ name, saying PEZ's main focus is to provide information to students who want to know more about issues on campus or with their lives.

Smith, an advanced addiction counselor, said the four main concerns on campus are stress, drugs and alcohol abuse, eating disorders and overall healthy lifestyles.

The peer educators of the group provide several services to Webster students in need.

The most notable of these are the personal one-on-one sessions for which student can make an appointment with a peer educator. The sessions do not necessarily take place at the PEZ offices on the first floor of Loretto Hall, but could include any comfortable place, such as Emerson Library, Graves said. Regardless of the locale, a student can talk to a peer educator about any aspect of his or her life.

"If (a person) doesn't feel comfortable talking to a counselor, we're someone of the same age group that may have gone through some of the same experiences," Graves said.

Graves noted the student members of PEZ are not certified counselors. However, in order to be part of PEZ, potential peer educators go through an eight-hour training class at Webster, after which they test to be certified by the state of Missouri as peer educators.

Smith's immediate goals for this peer-educator class include offering it for credit and merging it with the resident assistant training, since both groups could learn from each other.

Continued...

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