Peer Support Specialist Certification in Maryland: Training, Hours and Medicaid Rules

Maryland's peer credential is the Certified Peer Recovery Specialist, and its supervisor designation is the Registered Peer Supervisor — both issued by MABPCB, a private certification board, not a state licensing agency.

The board positions the CPRS as the title for the peer recovery workforce and reserves RPS status for the supervisors who document peer supervision.

Neither is a licence: an employer hiring a peer in Maryland is asking for this certification.

The Medicaid rule adds its own staff conditions on top, covered in the Medicaid section below.

The General Requirements make lived experience an eligibility line: you must self-identify as a person in long-term recovery from the effects of a behavioral health disorder — mental health and/or substance use disorder — for a period of two years or more.

The same page's design sentence also names family and allies of behavioral health among the people the credential is designed for, while the operative requirement speaks of your own recovery; if your lived experience is as a family member or ally, ask MABPCB how it reads the two lines before you apply.

Two years is a floor the application itself will attest to, so date your recovery accurately.

Applicants document 50 hours of peer-specific CEUs from an MABPCB approved provider: Advocacy 10, Ethical Responsibility 16, Mentoring/Education 10, Recovery/Wellness 10 and Harm Reduction 4.

Up to 12 of the 50 hours can be in-service training delivered inside an agency, and only 5 hours of non-interactive online or webinar training count.

On top of the domains, every applicant completes at least one CORE training of at least 30 hours — the page names the CCAR Recovery Coach Academy, Intentional Peer Support, WRAP Facilitator and the Mosaic Peer Curriculum as examples.

All trainings must have been completed within the last 10 years, and a high school diploma or GED (college transcripts in lieu) must be sent directly to MABPCB.

The experience floor is 500 service hours of documented supervised paid or volunteer peer recovery support in a clinical or community setting, completed within the two years before application.

The hours are evidenced by a service letter on letterhead signed by both the applicant and Supervision/HR staff.

Alongside them: 30 total hours of documented supervision by a Registered Peer Supervisor, spread five hours across each of six areas (Advocacy, Ethical Responsibility, Mentoring/Education, Recovery/Wellness, Harm Reduction, General/Self Care), documented at least twice per month; the board says individual or group peer supervision should be provided bi-weekly.

The two records are separate — the service letter proves the service hours, and the RPS documents the supervision hours.

The MABPCB CPRS page read for this page states no examination — certification rests on the training hours, the CORE training, the service and supervision documentation and the diploma or GED.

That is what the page says, not a guarantee that no assessment exists anywhere in the process, so confirm current requirements with MABPCB before you budget for an exam.

The board page read states no criminal-history or background-check requirement for CPRS applicants, and the research recorded the rule as not located.

An absence in these sources is not an assurance: employers, BHA-licensed providers and funders can run their own checks as hiring conditions, separate from certification.

If a record is part of your history, ask MABPCB directly before you pay application and training costs.

Coverage runs through COMAR 10.09.80, the Medical Assistance chapter for community-based substance use disorder services.

Peer recovery support services must sit in a written individualized treatment plan with specific individualized goals and be delivered through a BHA-licensed outpatient SUD provider or an opioid treatment program, in person or by telehealth (10.09.80.05B).

The staff rule requires active certification by BHA or its designee, completion of ongoing training as approved by BHA or its designee, plus the self-identification quoted below — wording distinct from the board's two-year recovery requirement, and the rule text read does not name the certifier BHA recognizes.

Rates took effect for dates of service from March 1, 2023: $16.38 per 15-minute increment for individual and $4.55 for group services through June 30, 2023, then $16.87 and $4.69 from July 1, 2023 (10.09.80.08).

Peer services may not supplant the minimum billing requirements for Level 2.1 and Level 2.5 services (10.09.80.06).

The SPA or waiver vehicle was not confirmed.

For the credential itself, the 30 supervision hours must be documented by someone holding MABPCB's Registered Peer Supervisor status.

RPS applicants need a Maryland clinical certification or licence in a clinical supervisory or director role that includes supervising peer recovery specialists plus at least a bachelor's degree, or a current CPRS who has recertified after two years with six months of documented direct peer supervision or lead-peer experience and a letter of support from their RPS, or six months in a behavioral health supervisory or leadership position.

Every RPS applicant also upholds the Peer IC&RC Code of Ethics, lives or works in Maryland at least 51% of the time, completes the 6-hour Peer Supervision training, and submits $100 upon completing it.

For Medicaid billing, 10.09.80.05B(3)(d) requires supervision by a BHA-approved registered peer supervisor, or by an individual practitioner or certified alcohol and drug counselor approved to supervise by the relevant board — and that second route must itself be an approved registered peer supervisor on or after September 1, 2023.

MABPCB is a consortium member of IC&RC with reciprocal properties on the international level, so an IC&RC peer credential held in another member board's jurisdiction is the route to ask about when you move.

Reciprocity does not waive the footprint rule: every applicant must be a resident of, or work in, Maryland at least 51% of the time.

Before you apply, ask MABPCB how your out-of-state training and supervision map onto Maryland's specific numbers — 50 domain hours, a 30-hour CORE training, 500 service hours and 30 RPS-documented supervision hours.

MABPCB requires recertification every two years: 20 hours of board-approved peer recovery specialist specific education including a minimum 6-hour Ethical Consideration course, a $125 recertification fee, and a re-verified adherence to the board's code of conduct.

You cannot resubmit the exact same training course used for the prior renewal, only 5 CEU hours of non-interactive webinar training count, and up to 6 in-service hours are allowed.

The Registered Peer Supervisor course cannot be used toward CPRS renewal, and RPS status runs its own cycle — the 6-hour Supervisor Refresher every 2 years, $100 per renewal.

Two 2023 changes: Medicaid rates for peer recovery support services first applied to dates of service from March 1, 2023, and from September 1, 2023 the individual practitioner and certified alcohol and drug counselor billing-supervision route must itself be an approved registered peer supervisor.

Regulation .05 of COMAR 10.09.80 was amended effective 5/15/2023 (50:9 Md.

R.

379) and again 8/5/2024 (51:15 Md.

R.

708) per its LII amendment history, so the LII text can lag the Maryland Register.

A search result showed a public notice proposing mental health peer services in FQHCs effective April 1, 2025; that page was bot-blocked and not read, so it is not established here, and the referenced Medicaid transmittals (PT 59-23, PT 60-23, PT 18-24) were titles in search results only.