Even the most independent, pull-yourself-up-by-the bootstraps kind of person would admit, if they were honest, that someone along the way helped them get where they are today. Maybe it was a neighbor who took an interest, or a great teacher, or an encouraging boss.
Mentoring a young person can allow you to be that kind of 'helper' in someone else's life. But for young professionals nurturing their newly-minted careers, the thought of sacrificing chunks of precious time (not to mention an endless supply of patience for rounds of Bakugan or whatever kids are into these days) to mentor a stranger can seem daunting.
The fact is, however, mentoring a young person takes about as much time as watching four weeks' worth of
Mad Men and doesn't require much cash or creativity. Walking the dog, washing the car, or watching the game can all be mentoring activities.
While programs exist all over Metro Detroit, serving almost every imaginable population, one of the biggest and best known is
Big Brothers/Big Sisters. The organization runs three major programs: A traditional mentoring program where an adult volunteer is matched with a child with whom one spends about four hours a month; a school based one in which mentors have lunch at school biweekly with their matches, and the fairly new Sports Buddies, which is aimed squarely at younger, sports-loving men.
Sports Buddies aims to overcome some of the traditional reasons men have for not mentoring, says LaRon Evans, who coordinates the program for Big Brothers/Big Sisters and who serves as a mentor himself. Many men, especially young ones who may not have kids themselves, can feel awkward when told to bond with a boy they've never met before. Sports Buddies puts youth and their volunteer mentors in group settings, doing things like going to ballgames, attending sports clinics and even watching games on TV – things these guys would be doing anyway, just with a child along for the fun. "I tell my friends, in that time you're watching the football game, you can bring a kid along with you and that's pretty much mentoring," Evans says.
The program emphasizes using the lessons of sports, like teamwork, preparation, and good sportsmanship to give boys the tools to succeed. And it's not the only Big Brothers/Big Sisters program that attracts young professionals. The school-based mentoring program is oriented toward those who have only a limited amount of time to give.
"It's really good for our young professionals who maybe have active weekend life and after-work life, but can maybe spend a half hour for lunch with someone," says Antonio Guevara, manager of mentor recruitment for Big Brothers Big Sisters.
Despite its light time commitment, the program packs a heavy punch. A study Big Brothers Big Sisters commissioned found that 64 percent of kids who participated in a school-based mentoring program had a more positive attitude toward school, 58 percent had higher grades, and 55 percent were better able to express their feelings, among other positive results.
It's proof mentoring does make a difference, says Marcel McTier. McTier was part of a program called
Student Mentor Partners, which takes kids with potential who are at risk of dropping out of school and puts them in quality private schools. It also matches them with a mentor. He attended Loyola High School, an all-boys school run by the Jesuits, and met mentor John Mozena, a kitchen and bath designer from Grosse Pointe Farms who had two grown children. The two found they had a lot in common, and became close.
McTier says having a caring adult who wasn't a parent or teacher was a lot of help as he navigated high school. "Parents try to pressure you to talk to them, but you don't really want to tell your parent everything," he says. "When you have someone that will listen to you and give you advice when you're ready it really helps."
McTier is now 21, in college studying environmental science, and in contact with Mozena on a regular basis.
Student Mentor Partners also offers its mentor matches periodic cultural or academic events with an eye to to broadening the kids' horizons.
But both McTier and Mozena emphasize it's not a one-way street. The relationship broadened Mozena's horizons as much as it did McTier's. "I took him some places I knew he'd never gone to – I showed him some things he's never seen, and he showed me some things I've never seen," McTeir recalls.
Mozena is now mentoring his third student, and said he's done things as simple as bringing them over to his house and cooking together and as complicated as giving them advice about peer pressure and street situations. "I tell them I will always give them a straight answer, that they can call me anytime they have a problem and I'll try to help them," he says.
Trust is a huge part of the mentor relationship, which is why most programs put a lot of effort into making sure a match will work before the adult and child meet. "It's (very) detrimental to match a child, then two months later the match is ended," says Neicy Mohammed, director of program and family services for
VIP Mentoring. Her organization matches children whose parents are incarcerated with mentors willing to work with them.
Tiana Baker is one of those mentors. She's been working with 18-year-old Kayla, her "mentee", since she was 13. Kayla is now graduating from high school and is considering colleges. Baker, a regional account representative for 3M, started mentoring because she was new in town and didn't know anyone. It's been a positive relationship on both sides, she says. Working with Kayla helped her take the focus off herself as she adjusted to a new city and gave her something to look forward to. As for Kayla, "We were together this past Wednesday, and she turned down the radio and said, "Tiana, I just appreciate everything you have done for me. You never stopped believing in me, no matter what.' When someone says something like that to you, you're good for the rest of your life," Baker says.
As rewarding as the more intense mentoring programs can be, they usually require a one-year commitment at minimum, with the hope the relationship will continue past that time. For a young, mobile professional who isn't even sure what her address or job title will be in six months, that commitment can be enough to scare them away.
Jewish Family Services hopes to recruit many of those people to its new career mentoring program.
In partnership with Common Ground, the program gives young people ages 16 to 22 some intensive career counseling and then matches them with people in their chosen field. The pair will meet several times over only a three-month period, and most of their interaction is focused on their shared career interest. "For people who are younger, or someone who has kids at home and is a working person, it's a very doable commitment," says Michelle Milanis, program director. Volunteers must be 25 or older, currently employed, and working in their field for two years.
No matter what shape mentoring takes, it's a very direct way to impact someone's life for the good. "Most people don't have the ability to make a big difference in society," Mozena says. "I do believe in what I call little victories. If enough people gather together with little victories, things can be changed – lives, families, futures."
Amy Kuras is a Detroit-based freelance writer whose
grandparents owned a grocery store in Detroit's Warrendale neighborhood. Her
previous article for Metromode was Going Green On The Cheap: Low Impact Development.