Source: MENTOR: The National Mentoring Partnership
It’s National Mentoring Month — time to celebrate the power of mentoring to change lives.
Researchers have found that young people with mentors are:
- less likely to skip school
- less likely to start using drugs
- more likely to enroll in college
- more likely to participate in sports or extracurricular activities
- more than twice as likely to hold a leadership position in a club or sports team
- more likely to volunteer regularly
- more likely to become mentors themselves.
That’s a lot of payoff for a single relationship between a young person and an older one!
Nine million young people in America grow up without a mentor’s guidance. They need your listening skills, patience, persistence, reliability and love. And you just may find a sense of purpose, a chance to share your experience and a connection to the future.
Lots of organizations are eager to find mentors like you. This winter, three national organizations – MENTOR: The National Mentoring Partnership, Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, and Strive for College – are partnering with Encore.org’s Gen2Gen campaign to help match more young people with mentors over 50.
If you’re interested in becoming a mentor, you can:
- Search the Mentoring Connector, the only national database of youth mentoring programs connecting volunteers to opportunities in their local communities.
- Find out how to become a Big Brother or a Big Sister to a youngster in your community.
- Sign up with Strive for College to be a virtual mentor, helping young people (via video, phone and email) apply for college.
You can also search the Gen2Gen Opportunity Finder for all kinds of opportunities from many Gen2Gen partners and other organizations working to help kids thrive.
What’s your favorite Gen2Gen mentoring movie? Nominate it today for a chance to win $500 in movie tickets!
Published: January 10, 2018