Standing Tall School Based Mentoring Program A school and a community working together to support young people to fulfil their potential ‘it takes a community to raise a child’ Report Summary Handbury Fellowship 2008 Jeanette Pritchard Standing Tall Introduction Standing Tall is a school-based mentoring program which has been implemented at both Baimbridge and Camperdown Secondary Colleges in the Barwon South West Region of the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development of Victoria. In 2008 a Handbury Fellowship, granted by RMIT University, allowed me be look at mentoring in the context of the current research on the well-being of young people in Australia, the link between well-being and educational outcomes and the current thinking regarding well-being in the Victorian Department of Education and Early Childhood Development. It also allowed me to look at the research on mentoring in more depth. As a secondary school teacher I was becoming increasingly aware that many young people are not taking full advantage of what we offer in schools. As the Professional Development Coordinator at Baimbridge College I was well aware that educators have traditionally seen the content of the curriculum and the competent delivery of that curriculum, by teachers, as being the most effective way to address the issue of disengagement. In recent years I have come to realise there are many other factors at work and I am now aware that meeting the social and emotional needs of young people, through the creation of supportive environments, is an important foundation for young people to take advantage of their education. There are many students in our schools who could benefit from extra support and the community stands as an untapped resource. Developing and implementing the Standing Tall school-based mentoring program has shown me that there are many people in the community who are willing to become involved in supporting young people if given the opportunity. Developing and implementing the program has been one of the most satisfying endeavours of my career. It is my hope that this report is able to capture how school-based mentoring can make a contribution and why it is worthy of support from government, community and schools themselves. Supporting young people is one of the wisest investments a society can make. This report has been finished at the time of the inauguration of Barack Obama, a time of optimism because of a belief that society can address its problems if its members are willing to work together in a spirit of co-operation and shared responsibility. Barack Obama strongly supports mentoring and in a one page advertisement in Newsweek he urged community members to ‘Be part of the change : mentor a child.’ Jeanette Pritchard Standing Tall Report summary Literature review In preparing this report a literature review was conducted in regard to: • contemporary research on the well-being of young people in Australia • disengagement of students in Australian schools • protective and risk factors for young people • current well-being policies and priorities in the Victorian Department of Education • research on mentoring and specifically school-based mentoring. Findings Schools are the greatest investment that Australian society places in young people and the concomitant expectation is teachers will prepare young people to move into society with the skills and knowledge necessary for them to function as competent and responsible members of the community. The quality of this preparation determines how much young people are able to fulfil their potential and its success has vital implications for society, as a whole as well as the individual young person. As is stated in the Doing it Differently Report: Improving Young People’s Engagement with Schools (Butler et al 2006): Genuine engagement with learning and with others within the school environment is a key to positive outcomes across a range of immediate and long term health, academic and life outcomes. In Victoria, the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development (DEECD) focuses both on delivering the best possible educational outcomes and providing effective pathways and transitions for young people. Young people in schools have, as a backdrop, a number of social pressures and research on the well-being of young people in Australia indicates that a number of them are struggling with a range of issues which impact on their mental health thus impeding their ability to fulfil their potential. In the education sector, disengagement, as reflected in retention rates, is a concern. The It’s Crunch Time- Raising Youth Engagement and Attainment report (2007) by the Dusseldorp Skills Standing Tall Forum and the Australian Industry Group looked at how young people are faring in the education system and concluded that retention rates have not improved in Australia in the last 15 years. The report highlights the fact that a significant number of young people aged between 15 and 24 are neither in full-time learning nor full-time work.2 The report How are Young People Faring 2007: At a Glance, also by the Dussledorp Skills Forum, quotes Professor Barry McGraw the former Director for Education of the OECD as saying: While other OECD countries have managed to progressively and incrementally improve school completion rates, the rates in Australia have barely shifted in the last 15 years. Many of these young people are disengaging from school early in the years of their secondary education. Awareness of the strong link between the social-emotional health of young people and educational outcomes has led to a focus on the well-being and engagement of students. In Victoria, DEECD has looked closely at practices and policies which create supportive environments for young people and has sought to identify the risk and protective factors in those environments. One of the most important protective factors highlighted in the literature is the creation of supportive relationships, particularly one-to-one relationships with caring adults. A major DEECD policy document, The Framework for Student Support Services in Victorian Government Schools (1998), makes a recommendation that there be: The establishment of strategies to develop a student’s sense of belonging to a school community and their ability to deal with life circumstances including the establishment of a ‘one-to-one relationship with a caring adult. The ‘caring adult’ in schools is usually seen as a teacher and two projects initiated by DEECD, the Advocacy Program (1997) and the Connecting in the Middle Years(2001) program, have sought to provide support for the setting up of one-to-one relationships between students and teachers. However, the growing pressure on teachers to deliver educational outcomes and complex assessment raises the possibility that teachers, even though they work hard to create supportive environments, may be unable to establish one-to-one relationships with the number of young people who could benefit from such relationships. Mentoring The establishment of youth mentoring programs which recruit and train members of the community to develop supportive relationships with young people can be seen as a proactive way to address that need for a number of young people. Jean Rhodes, renowned researcher in the field of mentoring, has found that the concept of mentoring fits in with a number of psychological theories which propose that a one-to-one relationship between a young person and a caring adult can enhance the cognitive, social-emotional development and identity formation of the young person if an emotional bond is formed. The most traditional form of youth mentoring is community-based mentoring and the research shows that, if programs are based on best practice, there can be positive outcomes for young people. Standing Tall However, the fact that the fastest growth in mentoring in the United States in the last decade has been school-based mentoring, has led to a number of research studies to ascertain if the different conditions of school-based mentoring can also produce positive outcomes. The literature shows that this can happen but once again finds programs must be based on best practice. Standing Tall school-based mentoring program The Standing Tall school-based mentoring program has been implemented at Baimbridge College in Hamilton, a rural city of 10,000 in Western Victoria. The College is a P-12 State school and its feeder schools are the State schools which service the city and the surrounding district. The College provides a wide curriculum and a range of extra-curricular opportunities and works on the premise that students have a belief in the value of their education and have a sense of connection to the College. However it has been the experience of the College that there are students who display attitudes and behaviour which results in them not taking advantage of what the College offers. Reasons identified by school personnel include the social pressures students face, such as family circumstances and peer pressure, and personal factors such as lack of confidence and motivation. The welfare structure at the College is strong and teachers work hard to provide a supportive environment for the students. However, pressures on teachers at the College can limit the time that they have to support individual students. The Standing Tall school-based mentoring program was established at the College in 2003 in response to a belief by personnel at the College that there were a number of students who could benefit from supportive one-on-one relationships with members of the community. The key elements underlying the Standing Tall program, many of which are based on best practice identified in the research literature, are: • recruiting suitable mentors. Community members who become mentors need to be non-judgmental, have good communication skills, be respectful of young people and willing to make a commitment. They also need to have maturity because mentoring relationships can be complex. • appropriate preparation and support of mentors - Preparation and training of mentors is vital as mentors must have a clear understanding of their role and the knowledge and skills to carry it out. Once mentors are in the program they must be supported. • needs of the young person. Each student who enters the program is different so there needs to be flexibility in the mentoring practice as mentors focus on getting to know the students and building up trust through a wide range of activities and projects based on the individual needs of the students. Once this is established mentors can assist young people to identify their goals and support them in achieving them. Standing Tall • early intervention. Students at risk of disengaging often show attitudes and behaviours early in their school career. There is value in establishing mentoring relationships before such behaviours and attitudes become entrenched. • length of relationship. Research shows that mentoring relationships need to have length to be effective. Mentors are asked to make a commitment for at least 12 months. • working closely with the school. 1) a school needs to be informed about the role of mentoring so there is a sense of ownership by the school and teachers can make appropriate referrals. 2) the program needs to work closely with the welfare structure at a school, respecting that mentoring is not a panacea and there are young people whose problems need professional support beyond what mentoring can offer. • clear message regarding mentoring. Mentoring is a concept which can easily be misunderstood and it is important that the school and community be well informed that mentoring is about empowering young people to realise their potential through identifying their assets rather than rescuing, ‘fixing up’ or changing a young person. It is not a replacement for other vital roles that teachers, counsellors and parents fulfil. The program has been strongly supported by the school and the community has responded positively. The program has set up relationships with students from Grade 3 to Year 11 at the College and its feeder schools and has been replicated at Camperdown College. Evaluation of Standing Tall program The evaluation of the Standing Tall school-based mentoring program explored the effectiveness of the program by assessing: • the ability of the program to establish close relationships between members of the community and students within a school setting • the identification of any positive personal or school related outcomes for young people as observed by the young people themselves and the observations of the mentors and the teachers • the contribution of the key elements of the program • the need to modify or improve any aspects of the program • benefits to the school, the mentors and the wider community. A total of 41 relationships were being supported in the program at the time of the evaluation however the evaluation focused on the relationships between mentors and students which were over 6 months in duration. All relationships assessed were Standing Tall with boys perceived as not taking full advantage of the educational opportunities offered. They ranged from Grade 4 to Year 11 students. Surveys were given to students, mentors and teachers. Focus groups were conducted with the mentors and interviews were undertaken with school personnel and students. Feedback was sought from the College Principal and members of the community and other schools in the Barwon South West Region of Education. Findings • The evaluation showed the mentors in the program have been effective in creating strong relationships with all students reporting that they felt they were liked, listened to and accepted as they were by their mentors. Most of the mentors stated that they believed that trust had built up in the relationships. In the focus groups the mentors spoke about the wide range of activities, projects and support for school work they had undertaken in response to the individual needs of students. • Personal and school related outcomes were identified by students, mentors and teachers. After six months a large percentage of students stated they were more confident and this was supported by the observations of most mentors. The majority of the students stated that their relationships with their peers and family had improved. • Most of the mentors stated that they believed their student’s attitudes to school had improved with almost three-quarters of the students agreeing. This could be because mentors often help their students recognise the relevance of their education to their future aspirations. A majority of students stated that they believed that the school cared about them, an important factor in a student feeling connected to school. • After 10 months of mentoring both teachers and mentors noted shifts to more positive attitudes and behaviours with teachers observing a shift to greater cooperation and increased motivation and mentors observing that a number of students were taking more responsibility for their actions and displaying a greater sense of caring for other people. In light of the research on factors influencing engagement, all these shifts heighten the likelihood of the students engaging with the school. • Although academic outcomes were not assessed, anecdotally a number of teachers reported improvements. • Research shows the value of increasing the interaction between different ages in building stronger communities. The program has set up relationships between different age and socio-economic groups. The evaluation showed that both students and mentors had benefited from these relationships with all the mentors stating they enjoyed the activities they did with their students and most of the students agreeing. All the students stated that they enjoyed having an adult as a friend and in the focus groups mentors stated that they enjoyed coming to understand the world their students inhabited and the challenges they faced. • As in most schools, records at Baimbridge indicate that boys are over represented in terms of behavioural issues leading to time outs and suspension. The findings show boys responded well to the support and encouragement afforded to them in a mentoring relationship. There have been a number of girls in the program and Standing Tall the report discusses possible reasons why their mentoring relationships have not lasted as long and have not had the same impact. • The program has worked closely with personnel in the school with both teachers and coordinators making referrals. Personnel in the school had seen that the mentors complemented their roles in the school with the school principal stating: The program has provided a support mechanism for students in the Hamilton community that was sadly lacking. The connection between the school and the community has been an additional benefit, providing a shared appreciation of the needs of some young people. Feedback from other schools in the Barwon South West Region indicated that the concept of mentoring could be of value in confronting the challenges they faced. • All the mentors stated that the program was clear about its goals and focus and they were clear about their role with most stating that the training was of value. All stated that they felt supported by the program and would like to stay in the program. • Feedback from agencies working with young people and the Local Learning and Education Network indicated their belief in the value of community involvement in the support of young people. Conclusions These findings show that energising and engaging the community through a mentoring program can assist schools to find proactive ways to address disengagement. It would appear that there is truth in the statement made by the Mayor of the Southern Grampians Shire during Youth Mentoring Week 2007: The Standing Tall program is a great example of how a community can form a partnership with a school to give young people a chance to fulfil their potential. The program also allows for community building and a real sense of achievement for the students and the mentors involved in the program. It helps to show young people that they live in a community that cares and that they are never alone. It brings out the true sense of community and it will hold residents of the Southern Grampians Shire in good stead in the future. General observations Engaging and energising the community to support young people through school-based mentoring is an attractive idea. The appreciation of the program by personnel at Baimbridge College and the strong response from other schools in the region would indicate that the idea resonates with personnel working in a system where they are pressured to achieve better educational outcomes but have to grapple with the realities of the many challenges faced by students which impedes their ability to engage with what is offered. Disengagement of students, which often presents itself in schools as challenging behaviours, can be a tremendous drain on the resources of a school. Research shows the importance of students feeling valued and connected in a supportive environment. Mentoring offers a possibility for the community to support schools in reaching their objectives. However, such an opportunity for beneficial partnership between the school and community must not be squandered, and careful consideration must be paid when of setting up such programs with best practice adhered to so the best possible outcomes are achieved. Recommendations • That school based mentoring be considered by the education sector, the business sector and the community as a worthwhile intervention to energise the community to support young people to take full advantage of their education • That school based mentoring programs be based on what has been identified as best practice • That program co-coordinators of school-based mentoring programs be supported to develop appropriate skills, knowledge and resources • That school-based mentoring programs have a good understanding of schools and be able to communicate the value of mentoring so that mentoring is accepted as a credible practice in enabling schools achieve their outcomes • That there be a understanding that school-based mentoring programs are complex and take time to develop in order to be effective • That there be further research on the different aspects of school based mentoring to further increase its effectiveness as an intervention of value. Endnotes 1. Butler, H et al, (2006) Doing it Differently: Young People’s Engagement with School on behalf of Anglicare Victoria, Brotherhood of St Laurence and Centre for Adolescent Health. 2. Dusseldorp Skills Forum and Australian Industry Group,2007, It’s Crunch Time. Raising Youth Engagement and Attainment. 3. Dusseldorp Skills Forum, (2007) How Young people are Faring, At a Glance. 4. Henry J et Al (2003) Connecting through the Middle Years Phase Two Evaluation. 5. Dubois,D, Karcher,M (2005) Handbook of Youth Mentoring, Sage Publications, USA, p31.