MENTOR California
While potential is equally distributed in every child, opportunity is not. Systemic and growing inequity manifests as gaps in opportunity, networks, and access to mentoring relationships outside of families. MENTOR and the Citi Foundation envision a nation where all young people can thrive through meaningful relationships.
None of us would be where we are without our mentors. Mentoring is linked to improved academic, social and economic outcomes for young people and is meaningful, fun, and empowering for mentors. You can make a difference by becoming a youth mentor in your community.
Resources for Mentors
About our Partnership
Through our partnership, we are advancing initiatives aimed at rewiring inequitable systems that don’t serve all young people well. Click here to read the press release announcing MENTOR and the Citi Foundation’s partnership.
Our partnership includes four main components:
Helping mentoring programs engage in more youth-centered and antiracist practices:
MENTOR will create a guide and training program for youth-serving organizations based on Critical Mentoring, a form of mentoring focused on the development of a critical consciousness in mentors and mentees. These resources will help organizations have internal dialogues needed to shift and adjust program practices, guide mentoring programs in supporting mentor/mentee relationships that foster meaningful communication related to social and racial justice, and support mentoring programs in effectively involving youth in program design and delivery.
Providing young people with skills and tools to be advocates for change:
MENTOR will create a Guide aimed at supporting youth-serving programs to develop or enhance initiatives involving youth-led and youth-centric advocacy and organizing work. MENTOR will also launch the second cohort of the Youth Advocates for Mentoring Program, which will train young leaders on advocacy, policy, and grassroots organizing skills in order to create positive change in their communities and nation.
Offering programming and opportunities for young people of color:
Five of MENTOR’s local Affiliates will receive Mentoring for Racial Justice Innovation Grants to pilot or enhance programming in their state aimed at dismantling systemic racism and inequities. In particular, these programs will focus on increasing mentoring opportunities for boys and young men of color.
Advance MENTOR’s diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives:
MENTOR will complete and implement its agency-wide Racial Equity Plan in our continued efforts to increase unity, transparency, and inclusion across the organization and our Affiliate network.
2021-2022 Mentoring for Racial Justice Innovation Grantees
With funding from the Citi Foundation, MENTOR launched its first-ever Mentoring for Racial Justice Innovation Grants Program for MENTOR Affiliates. Through this program, MENTOR will provide two-year grants to five MENTOR Affiliates to start or expand innovative local initiatives aimed at advancing the fight against systemic racism and inequities affecting youth within their local communities.
If you are interested in learning more about these initiatives or identifying a volunteer opportunity (i.e. Board Service, pro-bono consulting, mentoring) with a Grantee, please reach out to the main contacts listed below.
MENTOR California
Main Contact: President & CEO, Marcus Strother
Website: https://www.mentorcaliforniayouth.org/
Contact: marcus@mentorcaliforniayouth.org
MENTOR California will create a Coalition of Youth Leaders, training ten boys and young men of color from multiple organizations across California to conduct outreach and engage a broad mix of youth voice and perspectives to inform the Racial Equity Plan for Mentoring Black Young Men of Color (BYMOC) in Schools. In addition, the Coalition of Youth Leaders will identify ways to interrupt the dominant narrative by building the capacity of black youth to be authentically themselves, realize their strengths, and create a BYMOC: We are ALL Beautiful digital media campaign centered around visuals that combat the typical narrative of BYMOC and are inclusive of all boys and young men of color.
Mass Mentoring Partnership
Main Contact: President and CEO, Lily Mendez
Website: http://www.massmentors.org
Contact: Lmendez@massmentors.org
The Mass Mentoring Partnership (MMP) Youth Leadership Council (YLC) is comprised of a cohort of young activists that engage in legislative advocacy to help shape and inform Mass Mentoring Partnership’s public policy agenda which includes bills that address issues that disproportionately impact youth of color. YLC helps prioritize policies primarily serving low income BIPOC youth, addressing school funding inequities, school discipline, and mentoring for system impacted youth. YLC members are engaged in learning about the underlying causes of the school-to-prison pipeline, work with youth empowerment organizations, are trained in effective advocacy strategies, identify key stakeholders in government, and timelines of budget and bill filing processes. In the program’s culminating event, Youth Advocacy Day, these youth leaders turn knowledge into action by recruiting, training, and preparing their peers for meetings with state representatives and senators, creating public awareness campaigns and planning youth-led workshops. MMP will expand the YLC program allowing for more BIPOC youth to utilize their life experiences and perspectives into collective action and activism and to break down systemic barriers.
MENTOR Nebraska
Main Contact: Interim Executive Director, Melissa Mayo
Website: https://www.mentornebraska.org
Contact: melissa@mentornebraska.org
MENTOR Nebraska created and piloted Youth Initiated Mentoring (YIM) and has demonstrated it as a promising model for increasing access to mentoring for underrepresented populations, outside of typical mentoring programs, and in some cases including those with juvenile justice involvement. In YIM, mentor programs provide support for youth to identify and recruit a mentor from their existing social networks. Building on successful program development and engagement of community partners from Black- and Brown-led organizations with deep community ties and culturally responsive practices, MENTOR Nebraska will expand the scope of YIM approaches, create a toolkit with differentiated resources for diverse youth populations, offer technical assistance for partner organizations serving boys and young men of color, and provide a framework for replicability of YIM across the MENTOR Affiliate network.
MENTOR New York
Main Contact: CEO, Brenda Jimenez-Peralta
Website: https://www.mentornewyork.org
Contact: bjimenez@mentorkids.org
MENTOR New York created a Racial Equity Framework (REF) to guide the deconstruction of systems that perpetuate racist practices within the work of the mentoring movement. The REF addresses the top concerns of mentees, mentors, and program leaders and encompasses the core principles of elevating youth voice, deconstructing systems, and creating spaces of joy and wellness that support the social and emotional development of black and brown youth who have experienced trauma. The REF which will be converted into a toolkit that can be leveraged by program partners across New York and with other MENTOR Affiliates to implement practices to foster racial equity. This toolkit will consist of an interactive online tool outlining the pillars of the Racial Equity Framework, training materials and templates for program implementation. This toolkit will be developed with the assistance of mentoring, DEI experts, and BIPOC voices and expertise. In the second year, the REF will inform the launch of pilot initiatives with New York based youth mentoring programs and up to three MENTOR Affiliates to facilitate their own cohorts. The New York based mentoring programs and Affiliates will participate in training sessions as well as round table and feedback sessions to share learnings and further refine the REF.