Welcome to the Motivational Interviewing for Mentors toolkit! This resource is designed to help mentors understand the conversational style of motivational interviewing (MI) when talking to young people about behavior change. These materials were developed in partnership with our friends at the Youth Empowerment in Schools and Systems (YESS) Lab at the University of South Carolina, who have been pioneering the use of motivational interviewing in adult-youth mentoring relationships. This conversational style is an evidence-based enhancement for discussions about behavior change and includes many generally helpful conversational skills. These tools are designed to enhance just about any mentoring relationship and to support staff and mentors use of MI across a range of situations.

This toolkit consists of:

A core online training that mentors (and program staff) can go through free of charge.
Refresher videos that illustrate key concepts of motivational interviewing.
A brief guide that discusses how mentoring programs can optimize the use of these materials in their services.

Access Training

Download Guide

These videos complement the full online training by providing summaries and refreshers on critical aspects of the motivational interviewing style. See how mentors deploy this style in a variety of mentoring situations to help their mentee move toward meaningful changes in their behavior.

Additional Resources

Those who wish to go deeper into motivational interviewing may find value in these resources:

Acknowledgments

MENTOR thanks the following partners for their role in creating this resource:

The team at the Youth Empowerment in Schools and Systems (YESS) Lab at the University of South Carolina, particularly Dr. Sam McQuillin for his visionary use of MI in mentoring programs and Dr. Mackenzie Hart for her support in developing and testing the online training with mentors in a variety of real-world programs.
Our partners at Genentech, whose generous support helped bring these materials to life.