Girls Inc. of Holyoke match profile

This guest post was submitted by Rosa Santiago from Girls Incorporated of Holyoke

Mentees: Braneli, Isabel, Keyshamar, Luz, Nakeishy, and Nysha
Ages: 11-15
Reside in: Holyoke
Favorite Activity: Going to the library
Mentor: Rosa
Resides in: Holyoke
Braneli: “My favorite part is being with my friends in the library. I love it!”
Isabel: “I love when we help out at the little Girls Inc.”
Keyshamar: “What I like about mentoring is that we go to the library and we do math on the computers.”
Luz: “I love when we go places. I love going to the library.”
Nakeishy: “I think it’s great because we get to go out as a group and bond with each other.”
Nysha: “Going to the library is my favorite part because I get to read books.”

The group at Girls Inc.

Rosa: “Mentoring is very rewarding. As a former mentee myself, I know the significance of having someone in your corner unconditionally. The time I spend with my mentees is priceless. Their enthusiasm, love for life, and great hearts touches me every time. I remember, they suggested going to the library the second week of meeting. A couple of them didn’t have library cards and did not know how to go about obtaining one. It was wonderful helping them sign up for one. Another memory that stands out was watching them help other kids with their schoolwork in the library. I can recall walking into the designated young adult area and seeing them helping out other kids. Being a part of their personal growth is both an honor and a privilege.”
Matched through: Girls Incorporated of Holyoke. Within the past year, Girls Inc. of Holyoke has rebuilt their mentoring model to reflect the needs of the girls we serve. Our mentors are now full-time staff members who provide group mentoring to girls 11-15 years of age. Girls Inc. works with girls to develop critical interactive skills related to social competence, social behaviors, and decision-making. These are the key aspects of the Girls Inc. experience, infused into and beyond the specific curricular areas in which girls participate. Once a girl is enrolled in the group mentoring program, she participates in a minimum of three hours per week of comprehensive programs and mentoring time. In the past year of the program, our girls learned about Science, Technology, Engineering and Relevant Technologies (SMART), financial literacy, and leadership programs.
Phone: (413) 533-0796 ext. 109
Website: http://www.girlsincholyoke.org
Email: rsantiago@girlsincholyoke.org

Why I mentor: Beth Finn, manager of retail services at Staples

January is National Mentoring Month, and we are highlighting a number of perspectives on mentoring, events, and ways you can get involved in the field. Today’s blog is a Q&A with Staples’ Manager of Retail Services, Beth Finn, a mentor to an 18-year-old high school senior at the John Andrew Mazie Memorial Foundation in Framingham. Staples is supporting a statewide mentoring public awareness campaign for the third consecutive year.

• Why is mentoring important to you?

I have personally benefited from being mentored, and I continue to benefit every day. Learning from others is one of the best ways to grow!

• What is the most rewarding experience you’ve had mentoring?

My mentee and I love spending time volunteering, hanging out and having fun. Here are some highlights: creating cards for soldiers and working up a sweat cleaning the Broadmoor Wildlife Sanctuary at the Audubon Society in Natick. Through our mentoring program, we need to complete a number of volunteer activities, and even though we had volunteered already, we were short one volunteer event with an approaching deadline…so we did an impromptu park cleanup one Saturday. We picked up trash and loved it! Both of us really enjoy doing these activities together. Also, my mentee and I attended the Mentoring Night at Fenway last year. It was Dianna’s (my mentee) first time at Fenway, so it was great to bring her. The highlight came after the game. We took one of those bicycle pulled carts back to my car. We laughed hysterically as we sped around corners in Boston on the back of that bike. Neither of us had been on one before and we really loved it.

• What piece of advice do you find most helpful for the people you mentor?

Work hard at things that will allow you more options in life. For example, if you put hard work and effort into school, it can pay off by giving you more options on where you go to college. It might open up opportunities for scholarships and will ultimately put you in the driver’s seat of your life.

• What advice would you give to other adults looking to become mentors?

If you are thinking about it, just do it. You don’t have to be perfect, you don’t have to be their “parent,” you just have to be there. It is pretty amazing to be a part of and have an impact on another person’s life.

• Who has been a mentor in your life? What are some of the lessons they taught you?

My best mentor ever, hands down, is Dave Larochelle. I was “assigned” Dave as a mentor on my first day of work at Staples, and we have continued to meet on a regular basis for the last six years. Dave helped me transition from college student (extraordinaire) to Staples corporate office employee. He has patiently listened to, channeled, and encouraged my enthusiasm during my career here. Dave has helped me through challenging work situations, encouraged me to push harder, and at times, he just sits and listens to me. The best things Dave has shared with me is his perspective and time. I have learned so much from just listening to him share his experiences and how he has worked through obstacles. Also, Dave was awarded the Staples “Silver Stapler” award.

• What inspired you to become a mentor?

My experience with Dave.

• What mentoring programs have you been involved in?

The John Andrew Mazie Memorial Foundation.

Holyoke Boys and Girls Club starts staff mentoring program

This guest post was written by Megan Grant, director of program development for the Boys and Girls Club of Greater Holyoke.

For 119 years, the Boys & Girls Club of Greater Holyoke has been in the forefront of youth development in the Holyoke community, working with young people from disadvantaged economic, social and family circumstances.

Last September, the Club kicked off its staff mentoring program, in which trained staff members mentor one or more Club members. Mass Mentoring Partnership had provided training for our staff on the basics of mentoring and the impact it can have in a youth’s life. After the training, staff were invited to join our Staff Mentoring Initiative.

To date, we have successfully matched 20 of our youth with caring staff mentors. These mentors check in every day at the Club with their mentees, keeping up to date on school or family concerns while also providing a reliable and consistent adult presence in the lives of our youth. The Club also sets aside one-on-one time every week for each match. During this time, mentors and mentees go for a walk, shoot hoops, play cards, or just spend time together.

We had a special event in late December which allowed all of the mentors and mentees to get together and celebrate the amazing work happening in this program. 24 mentors and mentees travelled to Boston to attend the Celtics vs. Pistons basketball game. Our program members were also invited down to the floor while the teams warmed up pregame!

Justin and Sam before the Celtics game in December

Youth Development worker Justin Bresnahan attended the game with his mentee, Sam. When asked about his experience so far as a mentor, Justin said, “I really value the one-on-one time…I am surprised by Sam every day. He is the teenage version of me.”

He says the best moment int heir match so far was when he told Sam that they were going to the Celtics game. “Seeing his face – I felt like I had just given a kid gold. And at the game, when we were down on the floor watching the warm-up, it was 100% pure joy for both of us.”

Sam previously never had a mentor, and did not know much about mentoring before he joined this program. When asked how he felt about the program so far, he said, “It’s nice. I like Justin because he is so enthusiastic about things…and is always there to help me when I need it.”

The Boys & Girls Club of Greater Holyoke, founded in 1892, is an affiliate of Boys & Girls Clubs of America, one of the nation’s oldest and premiere youth organizations. Today, the Club serves approximately 4,000 young people. The Club has an extensive tutoring program and a variety of activities ranging from basketball, volleyball and swimming to table tennis, arts and crafts, computers and media arts. For more information please call Megan Grant at 413-534-7366 x 100.

Why I mentor: Teresa Herd, VP, Creative Director at Staples

January is National Mentoring Month, and we are highlighting a number of perspectives on mentoring, events, and ways you can get involved in the field. Today’s blog is a Q&A with Staples’ VP, Creative Director Teresa Herd, a mentor to a number of youth. Staples is supporting a statewide mentoring public awareness campaign for the third consecutive year.

• Why is mentoring important to you?

It is important to me to feel like I am doing something in this world that is for someone else. I have been extremely fortunate in my life. I have been supported and loved. So in return, I wanted to share my time, my experience and myself with others who may not have been as lucky as I have been.

• What is the most rewarding experience you’ve had mentoring?

I taught a kid to count change and tell time with an analog clock. He is 15. We had been working on it for two years. I did not enter this hoping for anything for myself. These kids have been through more in their short lives than we will be through in a lifetime. There cannot be an expectation that they will “give back” in a way we are accustomed. My hope is that my mentee will be able to survive on his own once he leaves the system, so I focus on giving him skills he can use…and also try to laugh a lot!

• What piece of advice do you find most helpful for the people you mentor?

It really depends on the kid and understanding what they need. I mentored a college student and we talked a lot about how to get a job, reviewed interview questions, where to look, what to wear etc. I also mentor a 15-year-old who has been in the system most of his life. We talk about life skills. The importance of education. The importance of being nice to people. How to get what he wants in life in a way that is productive. The range is huge. There is no magic bullet.

• What advice would you give to other adults looking to become mentors?

I tell them it is a wonderful thing to do. That it is a huge commitment. The focus needs to be on the child. They likely will not thank you. They may not even speak to you for the first few visits. They will feel you out and make sure you are a safe person for them to interact with and even then, you may not get the rewards that you expect. So if you go in with no expectations you will be pleasantly surprised by the little things.

• Who has been a mentor in your life? What are some of the lessons they taught you?

I have had many. I had a great high school art teacher. She really helped me understand art and guided me into my career. In college I became friends with an interpreter for the deaf. She was 10 years older than me. She initially hired me to baby-sit her 2-year-old, but we became good friends and she helped me navigate through some tough times in school. I have had a few very good bosses who I learned a lot from and a coworker who agreed to mentor me when I was trying to advance my career here at Staples. So many great lessons learned from all. I try to give back whenever I can.

• What inspired you to become a mentor?

I have done a lot of work for organizations and on boards. I wanted to do something where I could interact directly with the people supported by the organization. And I really like kids! I still do the other stuff but enjoy the mentoring the most.

• What mentoring programs have you been involved in?

Big Brothers, Big Sisters, Home for Little Wanderers, AFC Mentoring and The Point Foundation.

How mentoring shaped one woman’s life

January is National Mentoring Month, and we are highlighting a number of perspectives on mentoring, events, and ways you can get involved in the field. Today’s blog is a Q&A with Mandy Drew, who leads usability research, recruiting, and video projects at Alleyoop, a division of Pearson. Alleyoop is helping kids get ready for the 21st century workplace by attacking the college readiness problem. Mandy is equally passionate about helping teens realize their goals and aspirations, just as she did herself.

Mandy Drew

• Tell us a little bit about yourself.

I was born, raised, and casserole-fed in a small, rural town in the great state of Michigan. In some ways, I am still very much a product of that environment. In others, I know I owe my current successes to the many caring mentors who helped me believe in myself, showed me how to live up to my own potential, and made me understand that there is no limit to my own possibilities.

• Why do you think youth mentoring is important?

Growing up, I often felt the extremely conservative values surrounding me did not match the very liberal views I held. As a teen, I worried there was something wrong with me because I longed for a much less traditional lifestyle than what was typical of the region in which I lived. Without open-minded mentors to help me understand the world is a very big place with many different points of view, I may have continued down a path of alienation and disillusionment.

• Who were influential mentors in your life growing up? What did you learn from them?

Ms. Smith was my 11th grade history teacher, and she became a real mentoring force in my life. At the time, I was beginning to explore the feminist side of myself and I really loved how she taught not only the “male” side of history, but what she called “herstory.” She encouraged me to feel empowered as a female in an environment that found that type of thinking pretty subversive. I don’t know how she did it: not only was she going through a divorce that year, she was also battling breast cancer. By the middle of the year she had lost all her hair due to chemo treatments, yet she refused to wear a wig. She just wore her bald head to school with pride every day and eventually, as she recovered, her hair slowly grew back in. I remember thinking that was so brave of her. I TA’d for her my senior year and we both celebrated the day she grew enough hair that she could put it back in a tiny pony tail.

• What do you think is the most important thing a mentor can do for a child?

The most important thing my mentors did for me was to broaden my horizons. They showed me there was so much more to life than what I was currently experiencing. They told me how much better life could be and they told me exactly what I needed to do to get there: work hard and really commit to my education. It was hard waitressing my way through school—first through community college, then earning a bachelor’s degree, and finally achieving my master’s degree—but Ms. Smith was right. It was worth it to be where I am now.

• If you have personally been a mentor, tell us what that experience has been like. If your organization has been involved in supporting mentoring, tell us what you are doing and why your organization is involved in mentoring.

The Alleyoop team has a very strong commitment to supporting and mentoring young people in our community. Currently we’re working with students at Bird Street Community Center in Dorchester, and this month, we’re hosting students from Boston Collegiate Charter School. This spring we’ll be conducting our first job shadow days. Personally, I am in the process of becoming a Big Sister with the Big Sister Association of Greater Boston, and I also serve on Boston Collegiate Charter School’s Collegiate Council.

• Complete this sentence. If every child had a caring adult in their life…

Then every child would have a chance to see beyond their current situation and understand there’s no limit to their own possibilities.