‘Wanna chat?’ Canadian journalists building national peer support program
News industry seeks volunteers to be ‘colleagues helping colleagues’
Ask a room full of journalists and news professionals “who loves their job?” and most eagerly put up their hand.
Ask them ”who is stressed or burnt out?"
You’ll get a laugh. Almost everyone raises their arm, as they look around nervously, fearful of being judged.
Journalists have long relied on going to the bar for drinks after a long day, or shooting the breeze during a coffee break. But the truth is journalists don’t talk enough with each other about how they’re doing on the job psychologically - particularly in our ‘suck it up’ industry where projecting that you’re ‘tough’ is a point of pride.
But given the chance, most news professionals are hungry for opportunities to talk with each other, to vent, and not to feel so alone. We crave speace to talk about the mental toll of the long hours, rapid pace, public scrutiny, harassment and repeated exposure to death and suffering. Not to mention the stress of covering the chaos of our current world.
It’s why the Canadian Association of Journalists is building a first-of-its-kind nation-wide peer support program to offer safe, confidential colleague-to-colleague conversations.
Learn more / apply to become a peer supporter caj.ca/peersupport
“This is a new frontier that, we hope, will have a positive impact on the mental health and wellbeing of our community,” said Brent Jolly, CAJ president. “The peer support program will be a forum where we will be able to freely talk, share experiences, learn, and heal. Journalism is a human craft and our shared humanity means that we support our colleagues in their times of need.”
Peer support is a proven strategy used in other stressful industries such as policing, fire and emergency services. Its success is why a growing number of news companies (BBC, Washington Post, CBC, Reuters, ABC Australia, NPR) are setting up teams of trained colleagues who can be there to listen, problem solve and help colleagues decompress. Not counsellors, but colleagues with a few tools and know-how.
This spring the CAJ and its project partners will launch a pilot project to serve the estimated 10,000 news industry professionals across the country.
CAJ is now seeking 20 volunteers to be trained for this initial stage of the Canadian News Industry Peer Support program (CNIPS), with plans in 2026 to expand the network to include a team of 100 peer supporters. More at caj.ca/peersupport
I’m excited to be an advisor on this project. I led efforts to build an internal peer support program at CBC in 2023. It’s grown to include more than 70 peer supporters across the corporation and has helped serve more than a hundred and fifty of our people.
Colleagues connect at a CBC Toronto Peer Support event in March 2025. (photo Andrew Neary)
The idea of a Canadian nationwide support program takes inspiration from experiments in Germany and the Philippines.
CNIPS has won widespread support and financial backing from important players like The Globe and Mail, CBC, Unifor, the Canadian Mental Health Association / BC Division, the Canadian Press and the Canadian Media Guild.
“The pressures and demands journalists face are often hard for those outside the industry to understand. We hope a peer support network – that importantly includes freelancers – will prove to be a valuable resource for those working in Canadian media.,” said Melissa Stasiuk, Head of Newsroom Development at The Globe and Mail.
CNIPS will be led by a group of industry advisors and a steering committee that includes CAJ president Brent Jolly, Jane Hawkes of the Canadian Journalism Forum on Violence and Trauma and Carleton journalism professor Matthew Pearson who coauthored the Taking Care Report on mental health in the industry.
If you’re an experienced news professional who likes helping colleagues, and are willing to volunteer an hour or two a month, we want to hear from you.
To apply or find more information about the CNIPS program check out caj.ca/peersupport
