Youth mentoring is the process of matching mentors with young people who need or want a caring, responsible adult in their lives. Adult mentors are usually unrelated to the child or teen and work as volunteers through a community-, school-, or church-based social service program. The goal of youth mentoring programs is to improve the well-being of the child by providing a role model that can support the child academically, socially and/or personally. This goal can be accomplished through school work, communication, and/or activities. Goals and settings within a mentoring program vary by country because of cultural values.
Although informal mentoring relationships exist, formal, high-quality mentoring matches made through local or state mentoring organizations are often the most effective.
According to "The Encyclopedia of Informal Education":
"The classic definition of mentoring is of an older experienced guide who is acceptable to the young person and who can help ease the transition to adulthood by a mix of support and challenge. In this sense it is a developmental relationship in which the young person is inducted into the world of adulthood."
Mentoring effects.
Research.
Much research has been conducted on youth mentoring with the intent of determining whether or not there are positive benefits for youth and, if so, under what conditions the positive effects are most likely to occur. The evidence is somewhat mixed, however, and studies caution against overestimating the potential effects due to the small overall magnitude of association. According to some studies, not all mentoring programs are found to have positive effects. In some cases, youth involved in mentoring relationships of short duration or infrequent interactions with their mentors experienced no benefits or were harmed in the form of lower self-esteem. Even studies that demonstrated positive outcomes for youth suggested that benefits from mentoring do not always last for an extended period of time after the intervention has ended.
Meta-analysis.
One method of determining how effective mentoring relationships have become is with the use of meta-analysis. Meta-analysis allows a researcher to synthesize several studies and has been said to provide an unbiased, objective, and quantifiable method to test for significant differences in the results found across studies. Two studies utilizing this method are presented below.
In a meta-analysis of 55 studies on mentoring programs, the overall effectiveness of mentoring as well as the factors relating to variation in mentoring effects were studied. In this study, articles found on popular databases as well as possible search engines (such as Yahoo, etc.) that were published between 1970 and 1998 were selected and evaluated. Findings from this meta-analysis indicated that there was an overall positive, though modest, effect from mentoring. The effect appeared to be especially beneficial for youth classified as “at risk” (see at-risk students) or “disadvantaged”. Within this context, such student populations included youth in foster care, academically underachieving youth, youth with incarcerated guardians, youth involved in the juvenile justice system, disabled youth, and youth with children. Further findings indicated that effect size may be increased with the use of specific strategies and practices, such as providing continual support and structure to the mentor and relationship. It is important to note, however, that this study cannot imply causality and further research is recommended to explore this relationship.
In another meta-analysis, 39 articles published between 1970 and 2005 were analyzed. Articles were required to measure a quantifiable effect on either delinquency, aggression, substance use, or academic achievement. The overall effects were found to be positive with delinquency as well as with the other outcomes studied. Effects were stronger with the delinquent and aggressive outcomes, while still remaining moderate with the group measuring substance use and academic achievement. This suggests that mentoring programs are especially effective with delinquent behavior.
Best practices.
Research indicates that the use of specific best practices can be used to improve the mentoring experience.
In the meta-analysis listed above, several best practices were found to increase effect sizes in mentoring programs:
In addition, there are several mentor websites that suggest the inclusion of similar best practices with the hopes of created greater outcomes for youth.
Informal vs. formal mentoring.
In the research, there is a distinction between a naturally occurring adult-youth relationship (referred to as informal mentoring) and a structured adult-youth relationship where the mentor is assigned or matched (referred to as formal mentoring). There is less research available for informal mentor relationships than there is for formal, but the research indicates that benefits exist for both the mentor and mentee. Research is also available that suggests no effect or negative effects from mentoring, especially if the relationship with the adult fails. Formal mentoring has been better studied in the research and, therefore, more findings are available on this topic. In a review of literature, it was suggested that an emphasis in quality of mentoring relationship and programming has been steadily increasing in the research and a shift in outcome measures is apparent, with most studies measuring general youth development as opposed to reductions in particular deviant behaviors. In another review of literature, 10 studies were analyzed and found a moderate positive effect on mentee grades, reduction of substance use, reduction of some delinquent behaviors, but not with youth self-esteem.
These studies suggest that, although research is conflicting, there is typically an overall positive effect as a result of a mentoring relationship. This positive effect is more likely with the use of established best practices and within the population of youth classified as delinquent or "at risk". Quantitative analysis shows that academic-based mentoring has stronger associations with outcomes than does general youth mentoring. Most research agrees, however, that further research is necessary and that research with more rigorous methods would be beneficial to the field.
Benefits.
Literature that looks at the effects of cross-age peer mentoring suggests that while these programs may not always be effective, they have been correlated with "improvements on academic self-esteem and connectedness." Published literature also indicates that "formal community-based youth mentoring relationships" allow for successful intervention with children in difficult or at-risk environments. Mentoring programs for youth are mentioned as having significant benefits such as lower dropout rates in high school and subsequently increased graduation rates, along with an increase of enrollment into and graduation from institutions of higher education. On a day to day basis, youth participating in mentoring relationships demonstrate better attendance with fewer unexcused absences. Students adopt a more positive attitude towards formal classroom learning with more formidable relationships between students, teachers, and parents. Youths also acquire more self-confidence and better behavior at home and school. In turn, this improves their motivation to learn in a given subject area.
Youth mentoring draws on positive theories of "development-clinical psychology." These theories see the value of relationships characterized by communication, support, and trust, which shapes the character development of children. For teachers, mentoring means enhanced skills in supervision and better patience, sense of fulfillment, and increased self-esteem. Successful mentorships promote positive health through the improvement of academic education, positive self-worth, and social acceptance. Likewise, mentorships can decrease high-risk violent behaviors, usage of alcohol, tobacco, and drugs.
There are debates about the effectiveness of youth-mentoring as some claim that child development is influenced by interactions that extend beyond these relationships. Mentoring alone is not sufficient; positive development requires more than a cross-age mentor. The goals of youth mentoring, however, can be simply to turn obstacles into opportunities, and to provide a safe and structured space for children to discover themselves as they develop.
Approaches to mentoring.
School-based.
One prevalent method is referred to as the "School-Based" approach. Oftentimes, teachers refer students to participate in a mentoring relationship due to behavioral problems or difficulties with schoolwork. The mentor meets with the youth in an academic setting and facilitates school work while acting as a supportive role-model.They may also play games, do crafts or partake in non-academic activities. This approach is practiced by organizations such as Big Brothers Big Sisters which is located in eleven countries including Ireland, the United States, Israel, and Bulgaria. As of 2005, there was an estimated 870,000 adults mentoring youth in a school-based program throughout The United States alone. An estimated 70% of all formal mentoring programs in the United States are categorized as school-based. Canada has developed an in-school program in which elderly Aboriginal mentors are paired with both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal children to raise self-esteem, teach about native cultures, and provide support to youth in school.
Statistics prove that school-based mentoring will increase academic student involvement. The school-based approach revealed improvement in the classroom and socially. Mentors are matched with a student and they work one on one with the student throughout the school year. Focusing on schoolwork, the student’s interest, and other activities. As a mentor the expectation is to be a positive role model that is supportive and encouraging. This relationship will help motivate the student to be successful in school, reducing school infractions and truancy.
Community-based.
"Community Based" is another approach to mentoring. In this setting, a mentor meets youth in the community such as at a church, community facility, or by taking the child to community events. Individual vs. community based mentoring may be culturally specific, such as in India where youth are less in need of individual attention and thrive in a group setting, according to "The International Journal of Social Work". Both approaches can be done in a one-on-one or group setting between mentee youth and paraprofessional mentors.
Paraprofessionals are non-parent adult mentors who are recruited or volunteer to execute certain tasks after being guided and supervised by a professional service provider. Although the many community-based programs that exist today vary in design and delivery, the majority target skill sets relating to social integration, self-sufficiency, and academic competence. Community engagement statistics states that mentees after mentoring programs are 55% more likely to enroll in college, 78% more likely to volunteer regularly, 90% are interested in becoming a mentor, and 130% more likely to hold leadership positions.
A survey questioning 1,101 mentors through 98 mentoring programs found that school-based mentoring programs had fewer contact hours than community-based mentoring programs. Community-based mentors also self-reported to be “very close” to their mentees, while school-based mentors reported to be “close”. This survey used nine factors to benchmark the developing relationships. These factors are “(1) engaging in social activities; (2) engaging in academic activities; (3) number of hours per month spent together; (4) decision-making shared by mentor and mentee; (5) prematch training; (6) postmatch training; (7) mentor screening (only important relationship development in community-based programs); (8) matching; and (9) age of the mentee." The conclusion of this study is that school-based programs are a good compliment to community based mentoring programs, meaning that schools should strive to have a variety of mentoring programs in order to give students the best resources that fit to their needs.
Youth mentoring also addresses the issue of workforce shortages since it utilizes paraprofessionals for child services where the need is high but the resources are limited. Beginning in 2019, a new form of training—Just-In-Time Training—was proposed to help address shortages in child services. These strategies are proposed to even work “within the context of dynamic mental health services,” as they allow for services, normally directed towards professionals, to be executed just as efficiently by individuals with less official qualifications.
Individual.
Individual mentoring, or a one on one setting is where there is one mentor who repeatedly meets with the same mentee for the duration of their program. These partnerships can be found in both community and school-based programs. One on one mentoring is seen in programs such as Big Brothers, Big Sisters in The United States, as well as Mentor Me India in India. This mentoring style is regarded as one of the most widespread social interventions in the U.S., with an estimated 3 million youth were in formal one on one mentoring relationships. The traditional model is structured so that mentors and youth are paired through a formal mechanism and pairings are free to spend time together in a range of different activities and settings as to help build their relationship with one another. Individual mentor relationships or mixed with some group meetings were found to be more effective than solely group mentoring, found in a study in The New Zealand Journal of Psychology.
The most effective and successful mentoring relationships are defined by the development of trust between the mentor and the student. Studies examining such relationships show that trust is the most critical factor in determining whether