Education does not stop when we leave school and college; we go on learning through our experiences, and it is our experiences which are key resource that we draw upon in our relationships with the people around us and our relationship to society.

In S.T.E.E.R. we hold this experiential knowledge above the academic. We recognise the value of the academic environment as a stimulating nursery Ð but it is the real world that educates the person.

Thus, people with primary experience of mental health difficulties and who are, through those experiences, made self-aware, are prized assets to the organisation. Their primary knowledge forms the basis for them to develop empathy and understanding, when working with other people with mental health difficulties who may be in distress. Oftentimes, they have been in the same situation, perhaps many times before.

This also applies to people with secondary experience of mental health difficulties, who have so much knowledge of the difficulties of coping with people in distress, because they have seen it so many times with a family member or friend.

At S.T.E.E.R., we seek to validate people's experiential knowledge and augment it with established academic and vocational learning opportunities. This in turn, helps to build up a person's self-esteem, increases their self-confidence and feelings of self-worth. Through our partnership with the North West Institute of Further Education, we can offer another opportunities for our staff (voluntary and paid) and also the participants in our program.

To date, we have enrolled our staff, volunteers and participants on Management Training, Welfare Rights and Advice, Housing, Public Speaking, IT Skills, Cognitive Therapy and even Practical Philosophy. The knowledge gained is distilled and fed back to the organisation, there is a mutuality of benefit that is accrued, to the people taking part in the education opportunities and the organisation as a whole.