Stručni rad
UNIVERSITY-SPONSORED SCHOOL-BASED MENTORING PROGRAMS THAT TARGET AT-RISK YOUTH: A GLIMPSE OF STUDENT-MENTORS’ EXPERIENCES AND CHALLENGES
Abu K. MBoka
; Department of Criminal Justice,California State University-Stanislaus, USA
Sažetak
This article looks at how inadequate academic preparation and logistical and bureaucratic challenges, if any, impacted student-mentors’ experiences and how such impediments hindered the attainment of program goals. The program in question is a joint collaborative mentoring venture run by a local school district and a criminal justice department at a mid-sized four-year public university in the western part of the United States. The program’s aim was to increase student-mentors’ community and civic commitments as well as their knowledge of risk factors that generally inform delinquency, incorrigibility, and dependency. A total of 115 university student-mentors, who involuntarily served as student-mentors, were surveyed. Analysis of the qualitative and quantitative data generated shows that while the program had the potential to benefit both mentors and protégées, the majority of student-mentors experienced professional, logistical, and bureaucratic impediments. Results further suggest that the success of university-sponsored school-based service learning projects that target at-risk youth may depend largely on how well student-mentors are logistically, academically, and bureaucratically prepared as well as the degrees of commitment by both university and local school authorities toward easing some of the obvious difficulties student-mentors encounter. Discussions are offered for ways in which voluntary recruitment of student-mentors, adequate academic preparation, and reduced administrative hurdles and logistical challenges may enhance personal commitments and mentoring experiences.
Ključne riječi
youth mentoring; juvenile rehabilitation; service learning; university-sponsored mentoring service-learning programs
Hrčak ID:
85004
URI
Datum izdavanja:
27.7.2012.
Posjeta: 1.441 *