Our Teen Led Programs:
Peer Education
Real Talk Performers

Peer Education meets monthly at The Washington Hospital on the second Thursday of the month from 6:00 - 7:30 PM. Participating students serve as peer educators, newsletter staff, Real Talk Performers and junior AIDS Task Force volunteers. Peer educator volunteers are 9 - 12th graders who are trained to teach in their own school districts.

Teen Outreach professional educators have trained over 1000 peer educators since 1995! Our peer educators are dynamic and creative; they represent the face of America and are incredibly accepting of difference. They are trained in a three hour hands on, interactive training, and then provide supervised educational experiences to middle school and ninth grade students.

Our Peer Educators have evolved into a drama troupe entitled the Real Talk Performers. The Performers have presented educational drama locally and on a state level. They've received five first place awards for excellence and have presented at the PA Coalition to Prevent Teen Pregnancy's annual Youth Conference in Harrisburg, at professional workshops throughout the state, and as a preparatory for Dr. Sol Gordon's workshop, and at the Teen Outreach annual spring community award ceremony.

The following original dramas were created by Mary Jo Podgurski, RNC, MA, and performed by our Teen Outreach Peer Educators in the last five years:

1. Till Human Voices Wake Us (A one act play about the effects of teen pregnancy)

2. Lunch Table (A realistic, on the edge, look at a high school lunch room conversation that examines intolerance, stereotypes and peer pressure)

3. Gonorrhea Monologues (A lighthearted look at STI's - sexually transmitted infections - in which Gonorrhea feels left out because Herpes and HPV get more attention!)

4. The Real Love Story (An honest look at love in all its many forms)

5. Voices Behind the Masks (A "real life" approach to the concept of abstinence)

6. What If? (A honest, teen driven look at emergency contraception (EC) using puppets. Really.)

7. The Choice is Yours (A teen written vignette on the risks of tobacco use. Puppets again (Avenue Q has nothing on us!)

8. Dead Letters ( A poignant look at the content of a post office dead letter office. Created for the 2003 Peer Educator World AIDS Day program by Mary Jo's friend, author Anthony Godby Johnson)

8. Coming Soon - The Measure of A Man - a play with many layers that explores the rites of passage associated with manhood in American culture

Our Peer Educators were awarded the first annual Youth Advocacy award from the PA Coalition to Prevent Teen Pregnancy at Penn State in October, 2003.