My Brother’s Keeper (MBK) Success Mentors Initiative

MENTOR has partnered with the U.S. Department of Education and the Everyone Graduates Center to support the 30 MBK Success Mentors districts implementing the My Brother’s Keeper Success Mentors Initiative. Using an evidence-based and data-driven mentoring model and student support system to tackle chronic absenteeism, this campaign calls on schools to take strategic actions to reduce rates of chronic absenteeism among their students.

Resources for MBK Success Mentors Schools and Districts

The following MENTOR resources and tools have been created or collected specifically for districts and schools implementing a Success Mentors strategy.

Getting Started

Resources for District and School Coordinators: Getting Started

  • Be sure to read through the Elements of Effective Practice for Mentoringâ„¢, which details research-informed and practitioner-approved Standards for creating and sustaining quality youth mentoring programs.
  • Need help recruiting mentors from your community? The Mentoring Connector is the only national database of mentoring programs and is a free volunteer referral service. This zip-code searchable database allows mentors near you to find your program. Click here to learn more about the Mentoring Connector or to register your program.
  • No-cost technical assistance (TA) from an experienced mentoring TA provider can help you get started and make your program the best it can be. The National Mentoring Resource Center (NMRC) is a program of the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) and is managed by MENTOR: The National Mentoring Partnership. The NMRC provides no-cost training and technical assistance to mentoring programs to help them meet quality standards and implement evidence-based and best practices for mentoring. Click here to request no cost technical assistance for your program. Need help? Watch the below video and use this template request.
Success Mentors Guide

Training and Support for Success Mentors

MENTOR: The National Mentoring Partnership has created a guide to help Success Mentors program coordinators plan for mentor training and support, from the initial mentor orientation and recruitment stage, to mentor trainings and ongoing mentor support throughout the year. The goal of this guide is to assist Success Mentors program coordinators and managers in equipping mentors with critical skills and information, working with them to troubleshoot challenges, and encouraging them and celebrating their work, ultimately ensuring that the students paired with them have the best experience possible. In this guide, you’ll find a brief overview of key stages in a mentor’s journey, organized by season (from Spring to Fall, to Winter and the following Spring), and tips and recommendations to help you plan mentor orientations, trainings and support groups throughout the program year. For more resources and tools for starting your Success Mentors Program, also refer to Supporting Resources on this same page.

Reach out to your local Affiliate for additional help, or contact MENTOR: The National Mentoring Partnership, at info@mentoring.org.

Support Resources

Having a designated program coordinator for your Success Mentors program is a critical element to ensure your program’s success, effectiveness and safety. This Success Mentors Coordinator Training Facilitator Guide, created by Mentoring Partnership and Resource Center, guides school personnel and other trainers through the delivery of a training for Success Mentor Program Coordinators. Program Coordinators implement, oversee and manage the Success Mentors program, from the recruitment, screening, and training of mentors, to communication with students and families, to matching students with mentors, to monitoring and supporting these matches and ultimately supporting the healthy closure of the mentoring relationship. Program coordinators may be school guidance counselors, school social workers, school administrators, or other designated school or community-based personnel whose responsibility it is to oversee a school or district’s Success Mentors programming.

This training was created for use by MBK Success Mentors districts who were a part of the 2016 MBK National Success Mentors Initiative launched by the U.S. Department of Education and the White House My Brother’s Keeper Initiative. However, it can be adapted to suit other schools and districts who are implementing this model, if the components of the training relative to the formal MBK Initiative are removed.

This guide includes the facilitator’s notes, example PowerPoint slides, and accompanying handouts. It is recommended that this training be delivered with the support of your local MENTOR Sffiliate. Reach out to your local Affiliate for additional help, or contact Delia Hagan at MENTOR, at dhagan@mentoring.org.

Run of Show for Training

Training Handouts:

Using Text Messaging to Support Success Mentors

Monitoring and supporting your Success Mentors is essential to your delivery of an effective and safe program that truly benefits your students. Your approach to supporting the mentoring relationships in your programs will depend on your program model, the needs of your mentors, and the needs of your students. Because many Success Mentors are busy teachers and other school personnel, text messaging can be a creative way to supplement your monitoring and support approaches, with timely reminders that draw your mentors to resources, tips, and tools. Check out this guide created by Mentor New York, Using Text Messaging to Support Success Mentors, for tips and sample content that will help you use this innovative strategy with the Success Mentors in your school or district. And be sure to read the Elements of Effective Practice for Mentoringâ„¢ to learn more about the benchmarks for safe and effective monitoring and support.

Using Text Messaging to Support Success Mentors

Training Curriculum: Trauma-Informed Mentoring

Unfortunately, many young people have faced traumatic experiences that can create challenges in their lives and relationships. Mentors may not be aware of young people’s traumatic experiences, even when they know their mentees well. This training, created by MENTOR Nebraska, will help your Success Mentors understand the potential impacts of trauma on young people, and what they can do to support mentees’ healing and recovery. This training can also be delivered to mentoring program coordinators. It includes notes for facilitators to help them deliver this training, as well as accompanying handouts. Reach out to your local Affiliate for additional help, or contact Delia Hagan at MENTOR: The National Mentoring Partnership, at dhagan@mentoring.org.

Training Slides and Notes

Facilitator Overview

Training Handouts

Mentoring for Black Male Youth: National Mentoring Resource Center Population Review

This literature review, conducted by Bernadette Sánchez, PhD of DePaul University, focuses on both volunteer mentoring programs and informal mentoring relationships to explore the effects of mentoring for Black male youth.

Guide to Mentoring Boys and Young Men of Color

This Guide, created by MENTOR: The National Mentoring Partnership and My Brother’s Keeper Alliance, serves as a supplement to the Elements of Effective Practice for Mentoring and includes additional recommended practices focusing on boys and young men of color.

Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series (CMWS)

The CMWS is a free webinar series funded by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention through the National Mentoring Resource Center and facilitated in partnership with MENTOR: The National Mentoring Partnership. Join us for a new webinar each month focused on strengthening mentoring practice, sharing new resources, and helping the field put research into practice. Register for our upcoming webinar, held on the third Thursday of each month, or view past webinars here.

Talking it Through: Communication Skills for Mentors

This interactive online training is designed to support mentors who have been matched for a while and are encountering various challenges as their mentees open up and the relationship grows.

Wellness Mentoring Circles for Young People: A Guide for Facilitators and Mentors

This resource, provided by Concerned Black Men National’s CARES Mentoring Movement, was originally designed for use in their Wellness Mentoring Circles. It offers groups of young people an opportunity to learn about important aspects of their development, reflect on their experiences with the world around them, and receive support from peers and mentors that can promote healthy behaviors, problem-solving, and general well-being.

Mentors
Resources for Mentors:

My Brother’s Keeper Alliance Webinar Series

This free webinar series was developed by MENTORand My Brother’s Keeper Alliance to provide best practices for designing effective mentoring services for boys and young men of color.

Module 1: Know Thyself – Must Know Me to Build an Effective We

This virtual training provides a foundational look at race and privilege as it relates to the mentoring relationship. The training will give mentors and mentoring programs some processes and tools that allow for reflection into potential biases that may limit success of the mentoring relationship for boys and young men of color.

Module 2: Getting to Know You – Let Me Meet You Where You Are

This virtual training provides focuses on the boy or young man in the mentoring relationship and discusses the importance of social capital and racial identity.

Growth Mindset for Mentors Toolkit

These engaging modules provide information and activities for mentors to help them cultivate a mindset of growth and learning in their mentees.

K-12 Journey Map

This tool is intended to help youth and mentors track important milestones as youth make the journey from school to post-secondary education and career planning.

Tools for Mentoring Adolescents

This series of 10 fact sheets for mentors reviews many critical topics related to mentoring youth across the adolescent years.

Young Men’s Initiative Activity Catalogue

This guide features fun and thought-provoking games, art projects, theatre skits and role plays, and other one-on-one or group activities to do with your mentee one-on-one or in groups.

Resources for District and School Coordinators: Getting Started

  • Be sure to read through the Elements of Effective Practice for Mentoringâ„¢, which details research-informed and practitioner-approved Standards for creating and sustaining quality youth mentoring programs.
  • Need help recruiting mentors from your community? The Mentoring Connector is the only national database of mentoring programs and is a free volunteer referral service. This zip-code searchable database allows mentors near you to find your program. Click here to learn more about the Mentoring Connector or to register your program.
  • No-cost technical assistance (TA) from an experienced mentoring TA provider can help you get started and make your program the best it can be. The National Mentoring Resource Center (NMRC) is a program of the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) and is managed by MENTOR: The National Mentoring Partnership. The NMRC provides no-cost training and technical assistance to mentoring programs to help them meet quality standards and implement evidence-based and best practices for mentoring. Click here to request no cost technical assistance for your program. Need help? Watch the below video and use this template request.

Training and Support for Success Mentors

MENTOR: The National Mentoring Partnership has created a guide to help Success Mentors program coordinators plan for mentor training and support, from the initial mentor orientation and recruitment stage, to mentor trainings and ongoing mentor support throughout the year. The goal of this guide is to assist Success Mentors program coordinators and managers in equipping mentors with critical skills and information, working with them to troubleshoot challenges, and encouraging them and celebrating their work, ultimately ensuring that the students paired with them have the best experience possible. In this guide, you’ll find a brief overview of key stages in a mentor’s journey, organized by season (from Spring to Fall, to Winter and the following Spring), and tips and recommendations to help you plan mentor orientations, trainings and support groups throughout the program year. For more resources and tools for starting your Success Mentors Program, also refer to Supporting Resources on this same page.

Reach out to your local Affiliate for additional help, or contact MENTOR: The National Mentoring Partnership, at info@mentoring.org.

Having a designated program coordinator for your Success Mentors program is a critical element to ensure your program’s success, effectiveness and safety. This Success Mentors Coordinator Training Facilitator Guide, created by Mentoring Partnership and Resource Center, guides school personnel and other trainers through the delivery of a training for Success Mentor Program Coordinators. Program Coordinators implement, oversee and manage the Success Mentors program, from the recruitment, screening, and training of mentors, to communication with students and families, to matching students with mentors, to monitoring and supporting these matches and ultimately supporting the healthy closure of the mentoring relationship. Program coordinators may be school guidance counselors, school social workers, school administrators, or other designated school or community-based personnel whose responsibility it is to oversee a school or district’s Success Mentors programming.

This training was created for use by MBK Success Mentors districts who were a part of the 2016 MBK National Success Mentors Initiative launched by the U.S. Department of Education and the White House My Brother’s Keeper Initiative. However, it can be adapted to suit other schools and districts who are implementing this model, if the components of the training relative to the formal MBK Initiative are removed.

This guide includes the facilitator’s notes, example PowerPoint slides, and accompanying handouts. It is recommended that this training be delivered with the support of your local MENTOR Sffiliate. Reach out to your local Affiliate for additional help, or contact Delia Hagan at MENTOR, at dhagan@mentoring.org.

Run of Show for Training

Training Handouts:

Using Text Messaging to Support Success Mentors

Monitoring and supporting your Success Mentors is essential to your delivery of an effective and safe program that truly benefits your students. Your approach to supporting the mentoring relationships in your programs will depend on your program model, the needs of your mentors, and the needs of your students. Because many Success Mentors are busy teachers and other school personnel, text messaging can be a creative way to supplement your monitoring and support approaches, with timely reminders that draw your mentors to resources, tips, and tools. Check out this guide created by Mentor New York, Using Text Messaging to Support Success Mentors, for tips and sample content that will help you use this innovative strategy with the Success Mentors in your school or district. And be sure to read the Elements of Effective Practice for Mentoringâ„¢ to learn more about the benchmarks for safe and effective monitoring and support.

Using Text Messaging to Support Success Mentors

Training Curriculum: Trauma-Informed Mentoring

Unfortunately, many young people have faced traumatic experiences that can create challenges in their lives and relationships. Mentors may not be aware of young people’s traumatic experiences, even when they know their mentees well. This training, created by MENTOR Nebraska, will help your Success Mentors understand the potential impacts of trauma on young people, and what they can do to support mentees’ healing and recovery. This training can also be delivered to mentoring program coordinators. It includes notes for facilitators to help them deliver this training, as well as accompanying handouts. Reach out to your local Affiliate for additional help, or contact Delia Hagan at MENTOR: The National Mentoring Partnership, at dhagan@mentoring.org.

Training Slides and Notes

Facilitator Overview

Training Handouts

Mentoring for Black Male Youth: National Mentoring Resource Center Population Review

This literature review, conducted by Bernadette Sánchez, PhD of DePaul University, focuses on both volunteer mentoring programs and informal mentoring relationships to explore the effects of mentoring for Black male youth.

Guide to Mentoring Boys and Young Men of Color

This Guide, created by MENTOR: The National Mentoring Partnership and My Brother’s Keeper Alliance, serves as a supplement to the Elements of Effective Practice for Mentoring and includes additional recommended practices focusing on boys and young men of color.

Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series (CMWS)

The CMWS is a free webinar series funded by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention through the National Mentoring Resource Center and facilitated in partnership with MENTOR: The National Mentoring Partnership. Join us for a new webinar each month focused on strengthening mentoring practice, sharing new resources, and helping the field put research into practice. Register for our upcoming webinar, held on the third Thursday of each month, or view past webinars here.

Talking it Through: Communication Skills for Mentors

This interactive online training is designed to support mentors who have been matched for a while and are encountering various challenges as their mentees open up and the relationship grows.

Wellness Mentoring Circles for Young People: A Guide for Facilitators and Mentors

This resource, provided by Concerned Black Men National’s CARES Mentoring Movement, was originally designed for use in their Wellness Mentoring Circles. It offers groups of young people an opportunity to learn about important aspects of their development, reflect on their experiences with the world around them, and receive support from peers and mentors that can promote healthy behaviors, problem-solving, and general well-being.

Resources for Mentors:

My Brother’s Keeper Alliance Webinar Series

This free webinar series was developed by MENTORand My Brother’s Keeper Alliance to provide best practices for designing effective mentoring services for boys and young men of color.

Module 1: Know Thyself – Must Know Me to Build an Effective We

This virtual training provides a foundational look at race and privilege as it relates to the mentoring relationship. The training will give mentors and mentoring programs some processes and tools that allow for reflection into potential biases that may limit success of the mentoring relationship for boys and young men of color.

Module 2: Getting to Know You – Let Me Meet You Where You Are

This virtual training provides focuses on the boy or young man in the mentoring relationship and discusses the importance of social capital and racial identity.

Growth Mindset for Mentors Toolkit

These engaging modules provide information and activities for mentors to help them cultivate a mindset of growth and learning in their mentees.

K-12 Journey Map

This tool is intended to help youth and mentors track important milestones as youth make the journey from school to post-secondary education and career planning.

Tools for Mentoring Adolescents

This series of 10 fact sheets for mentors reviews many critical topics related to mentoring youth across the adolescent years.

Young Men’s Initiative Activity Catalogue

This guide features fun and thought-provoking games, art projects, theatre skits and role plays, and other one-on-one or group activities to do with your mentee one-on-one or in groups.

Support Resource Documents


Elements of Effective Practice for Mentoringâ„¢

Training and Support for Success Mentors

Success Mentors Coordinator Training Facilitator’s Guide

Success Mentors Coordinator Training Sample Slide Deck

Run of Show for Training

Training Handouts

2016-2017 Success Mentor Implementation Guide

Search Institute Developmental Relationships Handout

Checklist for Developing and Launching a Success Mentors Program

Success Mentors Technical Assistance Request Template

Success Mentors Coordinator Training Evaluation

Using Text Messaging to Support Success Mentors

Using Text Messaging to Support Success Mentors

Training Curriculum: Trauma-Informed Mentoring

Training Slides and Notes

Facilitator Overview

What’s My ACEs Score Questionnaire

Professional Quality of Life Scale

Compassion Fatigue Handout

Sample Training Evaluation

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  • MENTOR National and Affiliates will use the information you provide to better inform future publications and keep you up to date with advancements in the mentoring field. For more information, check out our privacy policy.