Welcome to the Mentoring Forums Community!
Hello! My name is Michael Garringer and I am the Administrator for the Mentoring Forums website. On behalf of the National Mentoring Center, I'd like to welcome you to our online community. We think these Forums are going to be a valuable tool for finding new information and innovative strategies for running a successful youth mentoring program. And we are excited that you have joined the conversation!
First off, a few housekeeping items:
1) If you have not read them yet, please see our User Guidelines and Frequently Asked Questions. The Guidelines cover the rules for using the site, while the FAQs explain how to use the site and what to do if you have problems or questions.
2) Please take a minute to poke around the site and see how things are structured. As you can see on the homepage, we've designated a number of topical discussion areas for you to post messages in. Please try and post in the appropriate content areas.
Once you are familiar with the site, you might want to post a short message introducing yourself in this "welcome" section of the site. We are hoping that this will be a fun, friendly place for mentoring professionals to interact, so please tell us a little about yourself and start meeting some of the other Forum members.
To get the ball rolling, a little about myself: I've worked at the National Mentoring Center for almost 11 years. Some of you may remember me from our work on OJJDP's JUMP initiative back in the day. I've been on the Mentoring Resource Center project since it started up back in 2004. My role has been to build the MRC website, oversee the MRC's publications, and help develop our online tools, such as, well, this Forum!
I'd like to personally welcome you to this online community. I look forward to reading your posts and benefiting from the collective wisdom of everyone who is participating.
If you need to contact me about anything site related, you can get a hold of me in a number of ways:
1) by using the Forums' private message feature (please note that you must be logged into the Forums to do this)
2) via email at garringm@nwrel.org
3) or by phone at 503-275-9647
Once again, welcome to the site and we look forward to "talking" to you!
Thanks for the kind words, Dan! I share your vision for what these Forums can become for the field. And I'll be sure to check out the Ning forum you have set up! I think these types of tools are going to be very important in moving the mentoring field forward.
Thank you for providing a place where people can go to exchange ideas. I will be starting a brand new mentoring program in the fall. If anyone has any helpful materials or information for a new program, I would love to get it.
Thanks,
Nixyaawii
Welcome Nixyaawii!
If you are just getting started, allow me to toot our own horn about some of our resources. I think the recently revised publications you can find at the top of this page represent a really good starting point for developing your program: http://www.nwrel.org/mentoring/nmc_pubs.php
MENTOR's Elements Toolkit is also an excellent starting point:
http://www.mentoring.org/find_resources/tool_kit/
I'm sure you will find lots of wisdom in these forums that will help you along the way.
This is a great website indeed! A very good one for me and my entire team. Having gone through the posted topics and discussions thus far, I know there is so much for us to learn here, and I've gained alot already. . .
Our main objective as a Youth-led Organisation is to help improve on Academic Performances of young people through Mentoring. We term our initiative Youths Mentoring Youths and we are based in West Africa.
I've got loads of questions and i need better clarifications on this interesting art of mentoring. But, i shall hold it till I've toured the entire web pages.
Once again, Kudos to everyone.
Best Regards!
Tosin
Executive Director
Youths Mentoring Youths
tosin@rsnnigeria.org
Welcome, Tosin! We're always interested in getting international perspectives on mentoring. There is a lot of expertise in the members of this forum, so please ask questions and let us know how mentoring is being used in your part of the world.
Here in the US, mentoring is often used to boost academic achievement by focusing on the young person's connectedness to school, the idea being that they cannot do well in school if they are not feeling welcomed, supported, and guided in the work they must do. I'm curious to hear about the vision you have for your programs and the setting you will be working in.
Thank you Michael, I appreciate your response.
Interestingly, we (RSN) share same objectives with the US Mentoring scheme. It's true that students who don't feel welcomed, supported and guided in their works won't do pretty well in their academics, hence, the reason why we have to step in to help these younger generations.
Unlike what is obtainable over there, In Nigeria, Mentoring scheme isn't part of our Education system. So, a lot of students don't know about it and its importance! Therefore, as a concerned fellow, and a beneficiary of the Women Mentoring Women Project (Courtesy of IdeaBuilders in partnership with Vital Voices, USA) I have decided to adopt and introduce this scheme to my youth led non-profit organization and it has been pretty exciting, especially with the feedback we get from the Mentees and Mentors. They like it!
The first cycle was for 8months and by October 2009 we shall be launching into the next mentoring cycle, our targets are High School Students in class 3. Fifty students to be precise, and they are going to be paired with volunteered young professionals.
We've decided to come up with a Mentor-Training Programme for all Mentors and this comes up on the 1st of October. Thanks to the resources shared on this website and to the resourceful email received from Patti! They made a whole lot of senses! Thank you.
Really, we look forward to having a great Mentor Orientation Day and a fabulous Mentoring cycle. . .
Thank You.
Tosin
Hello,
It's good to be back after a long period of time! As earlier announced, we had a successful Orientation Programme for Mentors, Mentees and Mentiee's Parents.
Thanks to NWREL for the vital information you've got on this website.
Tosin
Hi Mike,
Thanks for setting up this forum. I'll do what I can to help it become a place where people meet to exchange ideas, and collaborate on actions that help us all build and sustain constantly improving tutor/mentor programs in places where they are needed.
I feel that to draw people to a forum like this we need to be active in many other places, sharing our ideas, and pointing to places where we meet with others. I've added links to the forum on the Tutor/Mentor Connection site and encourage you to spend some time each month writing articles or sharing information in the forums we host.
I hope that through our combined efforts we can not only draw program leaders, and possibly volunteers to this forum, but that we'll also draw donors, media, evaluators and public leaders. Until we get all of these groups in the same room I'm afraid our idea sharing will have limited impact because of our inability to find the consistent dollars to sustain key people in leadership roles in the hundreds of organizations that operate volunteer-based tutor/mentor strategies.
I'll look forward to learning from you and the group as I have in the Mentor Exchange list that you've hosted in the past.
Daniel F. Bassill
President
Cabrini Connections
Tutor/Mentor Connection
800 W. Huron, Chicago, IL 60642
312-492-9614