Catalyst Mentoring
Mentoring for the community by the community
Mentoring by community for community To We wanted to inform you of a new scheme that we have set up for community mentoring in local secondary schools. We are partnering with The Children’s Society. Please read through and if this interests you please contact Lou on 07923366682 louise@ccswt.org.uk
Catalyst mentoring is looking to provide mentors from the local church community and across the generations to be a trained volunteer mentor to young people in secondary schools. It seems odd suggesting this to you, in light of the summer riots but I can assure you this is not a knee-jerk response to the news. Yet we believe this project is timely as it has developed over the last year. We believe that Community relies this will continue to on action. This is develop links between a positive the generations and creative response community. not just an
opinion that joins the masses.
The idea We believe young people need more positive roles models in their life, of all ages. Many young people don’t have the ‘grandparent generation’ that historically others have grown with. How great if we could send teams of people of older generations into schools to mentor and encourage a joint thinking across the divide of age. Is this not part maybe of what the ‘Big Society’ is meant to be? Even if ‘Big Society’ is discontinued by the government, isn’t there something of a jewel in the concept? How much more therefore in the outworking of it? The project is looking to be funded by The Children’s Society (as part of the Good Childhood report) and by Canterbury Christian Schools Work Trust.
What bit? CATALYST will train and check each mentor and are compliant with any additional systems that your school will need to put workers through. We will require a main contact that we can liaise with and who can meet and agree to each mentor. We would only look at one or two mentors matched to each school at first. Mentors volunteer for at least one hour a week, to sit informally, with young people and chat about issues going on in their lives and maybe offering some form of direction though mainly just connecting as a listening post. Therefore we ask that they could have a safe space for this to take place in.
about
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*Church*
Mentors will be representing the church community but more in their character than anything else. They will be trained by a professional mentor and are in your school to listen and encourage, not proselytizing. Our values are to be inclusive, nonjudgemental, and a listening post to the young person. Project leader Louise Funnell has had 8 years of mentoring experience both in and outside of the church always with positive feedback Please see www.ccswt.org.uk for more info
CATALYST MENTORING www.ccswt.org.uk 07823366684 louise@ccswt.org.uk