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Clearing the hurdles :

Clearing the hurdles :. PSD Mentoring. Prepared & Presented By: Renata Cobbs Fletcher Consultant, M.H. West & Co. Persistently Dangerous Schools Grantee Conference September 20-21, 2011. Purpose of Workshop.

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Clearing the hurdles :

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  1. Clearing the hurdles: PSD Mentoring Prepared & Presented By: Renata Cobbs Fletcher Consultant, M.H. West & Co. Persistently Dangerous Schools Grantee Conference September 20-21, 2011

  2. Purpose of Workshop To provide PSD grantees with practical applications and strategies for successfully creating or revising a life coaching (mentoring) program for the PSD project To provide an opportunity for best practice exchange and brainstorming on successes and challenges

  3. Ice Breaker Who was/is the most important mentor in your life? Why?

  4. Why Mentoring in PSD? • Better academic performance for students • Better school attendance for students • Decreased likelihood of drug and/or alcohol use • Decreased violent behavior in students • Stronger likelihood of students attending college

  5. Defining Mentoring: What is it? • A relationship between a youth and a caring adult that supports the youth in overcoming barriers and reaching his or her full potential academically and socially

  6. Exercise: Group Activity & Report Out • Accomplishments • Disappointments • How best practice-saturated are your current approaches (exercises)? • What should continue? • What should stop? • What should start?

  7. Refining/Expanding the PSD Mentoring Model • Group • One-to-One • Service-based mentoring • Career-based mentoring

  8. 1:1 Mentoring • Must meet consistently (4 hours/month) – participant’s choice • Various activities – participant’s/mentee’s choice • Informal conversations

  9. 1:1 Advantages • Deeper, more meaningful relationships • More flexibility with meeting times and locations • Time and transportation • Other advantages?

  10. 1:1 Challenges • Resistance by students (hierarchy) • Demanding for programs – intensive recruitment, training, supervision of mentors • Challenging/off-putting for potential mentors • Harder to retain mentors/bigger feelings of mentor failure • Other challenges?

  11. Group Mentoring • Must meet consistently as a group – ideally the same group – same time and place (most of the time) • Longer sessions • More structured – often topic driven, determined by mentors and students • Sometimes curriculum driven

  12. Group Mentoring: Advantages • Fewer mentors required • Less intensive recruitment • Less demanding on staff time • Potentially more appealing to students

  13. Group Mentoring: Advantages • Relationships and support not always as strong • Could foster feelings of academic “institutionalization” • Less commitment from life coaches and students – easier to rationalize not showing up • Other advantages?

  14. Group Mentoring: Challenges • Groups can change configurations and relationships can be lost • If groups are too large, relationships can be lost • Curriculum and facilitation can end up being more like a class • Other challenges?

  15. Combination: Group + 1:1 • Group focus with supplementary and pre-matched 1:1 • Group focus with supplementary and “naturally evolving”, spontaneous 1:1 • 1:1 Focus with supplementary group meetings (occasional)

  16. Combination: Group + 1:1: Advantages • Best of both worlds • Offsets challenges of both models • Other advantages?

  17. Combination: Group + 1:1: Challenges • Any challenges?

  18. Service-Based Mentoring • Same best practice guidelines as other types of mentoring • Activity-driven • Can be completed as 1:1 or group mentoring

  19. Service-Based Mentoring: Advantages • Students gain sense of “giving back” • Other advantages?

  20. Service-Based Mentoring: Challenges • May be perceived as work by students • Other challenges?

  21. Career-Based Mentoring: Advantages • Exposure for students to a range of career opportunities • Exposure for students to work environments and cultures

  22. Career-Based Mentoring: Challenges • May be intimidating/uncomfortable to some students to be in workplace environments • May not be adequate opportunities to match students with their priority interest

  23. Team Exercise • Write a mission statement for the mentoring component of your PSD program (main purpose of mentoring program)

  24. What Makes a Good Mentor? • A nonjudgmental attitude • Good listening skills • An ability to help participants stay focused on the big picture • A willingness to offer guidance, support and assistance with personal and school-related challenges • An ability to help students problem-solve and think about the choices they can make

  25. Recruiting, Matching & Retaining • Case study (Susie Mentor)

  26. Closing • Q&A • True heroism is remarkably sober, very undramatic. It is not the urge to surpass all at whatever cost, but the urge to serve others at whatever cost." ~ Arthur Ashe

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