What is the Academy?

The Los Angeles County Peer-to-Peer Learning Academy is a training pilot program developed by the Los Angeles County Office of Violence Prevention (OVP), in the Department of Public Health and managed by The Community Based Public Safety Collective. The training is funded with federal American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) dollars in partnership with the California Community Foundation, as part of the Trauma Prevention Partnerships project.

The goal of the Academy is to build a training infrastructure for community-based organizations to strengthen the skillsets of their peer workforce within the field of Community Violence Intervention (CVI). The Academy will be available to ARPA Trauma Prevention Partnerships grantees, and OVP’s Trauma Prevention Initiative grantees, with a limited number of openings for other community members that provide peer outreach for communities impacted by violence, and take place between March and December 2024.

Training topics were identified as Intervention Industry Standards based on input from peers across the County, building on best practices and incorporating new modules to meet the evolving needs of the field, and will be refined with input from the Collective’s advisory committee. The core of the Academy will be a CVI certification program for 300 intervention specialists. Participants will have the opportunity to take other courses outside of the CVI certification tracks.

Infused into the Academy is a holistic approach to violence intervention which recognizes the need to heal the trauma that leads to acts of violence and center survivors in our pursuit of public safety. Training topics will include recognized Intervention Industry Standards including license-to–operate (LTO), hospital protocols, crisis response protocols, safe passages, and safety deployment, as well as Black and Brown conflict solutions, navigating social media, restorative justice, trauma informed practice, intimate partner violence, youth development, and other topics.

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Class Calendar

Working with Clients that have Experienced Trauma: November 20

Working with Clients that have Experienced Trauma: November 20

November 20, 2024    
9:30 am - 2:30 pm
$0.00
Miyume McKinnley’s mission is to eliminate the stigma that prevents the pursuit of mental health services through education, community outreach, innovative therapeutic approaches, and removing [...]
Improving Community Safety Through Effective Advocacy in the Youth Justice System: November 21

Improving Community Safety Through Effective Advocacy in the Youth Justice System: November 21

November 21, 2024    
9:30 am - 3:00 pm
$0.00
The Pacific Juvenile Defender Center (PJDC) provides support to juvenile trial lawyers, appellate counsel, law school clinical programs, and nonprofit law centers to ensure quality [...]
Interaction with Law Enforcement Professional Understanding, and Legal Liability: November 21

Interaction with Law Enforcement Professional Understanding, and Legal Liability: November 21

November 21, 2024    
12:00 pm - 3:00 pm
$0.00
Participating violence prevention specialists/public safety practitioners will learn about the laws that apply and the legal issues related to their work, and how to manage [...]
Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) Certification Training: November 25

Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) Certification Training: November 25

November 25, 2024    
9:30 am - 5:00 pm
$0.00
Miyume McKinnley’s mission is to eliminate the stigma that prevents the pursuit of mental health services through education, community outreach, innovative therapeutic approaches, and removing [...]
Childhood conditioning and Intergenerational trauma - Zoom Follow-up QAs: November 29

Childhood conditioning and Intergenerational trauma - Zoom Follow-up QAs: November 29

November 29, 2024    
7:30 pm - 8:30 pm
$0.00
Fear for Breakfast is run by formerly incarcerated people and those who are passionate about helping others. We aim to bridge the gap between those [...]
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Course Certification

Participants will have the opportunity to earn professional certification as well as complete individual workshops.

The most comprehensive certificate is the Community Violence Intervention Specialist track. At the core is the 2 week (80 hour) Professional Community Intervention Training Institute (P.C.I.T.I.) requirement. Dr. Aquil Basheer will lead new practitioners through the fundamentals of boots on the ground conflict mediation, deescalation, and violence intervention. Additional courses will round out the training with understanding the different types of violence that plague communities and how to implement healing practices into the work.

The Academy will also offer a Leadership certificate aimed at practitioners who have been part of violence intervention and prevention strategies and are ready to shift from the boots on the ground position into supervision, case management, or starting your own agency. The Leadership Certificate requires a prior certificate in LAVITA  or  PCITI. Participants will take a 3 day refresher course on daily community interaction as well as grant writing and accessing victim/survivor funds. Leadership participants will learn new strategies to scale up their agency’s programmatic infrastructure.

There is no requirement that every participant earn a singular certificate. In addition to the core tracks above, participants may earn shorter certificates in the below three concentrations:

Establishing a Violence Interruption Agency 

Healing Practices

Understanding Violence (requirements below)

Leadership in Violence Intervention

All courses below are mandatory, please choose one course from each of the five groupings.

To complete the certification, each participant must take all mandatory classes outlined below. Additionally, participants must take at least one of the classes listed in each of the five special Groupings.

Certification Requirements

Establishing a Violence Interruption Agency

To complete the certification, each participant must take all mandatory classes outlined below.

Certification Requirements

Healing Practices

To complete the certification, each participant must take all mandatory classes outlined below.

Certification Requirements

Understanding Violence

To complete the certification, each participant must take all mandatory classes outlined below.

Certification Requirements

Ambassador Training

To complete the certification, each participant must take all mandatory classes outlined below.

Certification Requirements