Corporate Campus Mentoring Program, BSW II

This continues content from the PowerPoint presentation with the extraordinary results of BSW.

BEYOND SCHOOL WALLS

An Innovative Mentoring Program

Big Brothers Big Sisters of Southeastern Pennsylvania

Spotlight on Success

Comcast Corporation & Fairhill Elementary

Fairhill Elementary School

• 99.4% economically disadvantaged 
• 51.4% of students are chronically truant--10 or more unexcused absences
• 49% of adults 18-24 have no high school degree
• Ranks a 10 on OJJDP's Community Disadvantage Index--indicating this census tract is among the most disadvantaged in the country

Photos from BSW presentation

Comcast

Program started during the 2008-09 school year                   

• 29 matches in year one
• 45 in each year since [January 2012] 
• All levels of the organization from entry-level to CFO

The Impact

• 51% of Fairhill students are "chronically truant"
• Every single student mentored in the Beyond School Walls program reduced their unexcused absences
• More than 50 incidents reported to the office of school safety, including three              assaults on teachers and 23 assaults on students so far this year
• 81% of students mentored in Beyond School Walls had zero disciplinary infractions

Additional Benefits

• Comcast has adopted the school
• Brother of a Little (mentee) secured an internship
• Rolled the program out in 10 other markets

Growth

• Started with 1 program in 2005, currently have 21 programs [2012]
• Serving kids in 2nd through 12th grade
• Large and small companies
• Shared programs
• U.S. Attorneys/FBI/Federal Defenders
• Business Parks
• Helping us redefine our impact

• Education
• Volunteerism
• Corporate retention

Presenters: Judy Spangler, Chief Programs Officer, BBBSSEPA

Ted Qualli, VP, External Affairs & Marketing, BBBSSEPA

End of Part II of the Beyond School Walls adaptable model

Excerpts from the presentation PowerPoint                                                                      

National Mentoring Summit 2012, Washington, DC DC                                                                         1-25-12

Corporate Campus Mentoring Program, BSW I

With or without the help of a Big Brothers Big Sisters organization, this is a highly adaptable model for communities of various sizes. BSW began with elementary but now extends through twelfth grade.

BEYOND SCHOOL WALLS

An Innovative Mentoring Program

Big Brothers Big Sisters of Southeastern Pennsylvania

Presenters: Judy Spangler, Chief Programs Officer, BBBSSEPA

Ted Qualli, VP, External Affairs & Marketing, BBBSSEPA      
                         

The Innovation: KIDS  TO  MENTORS

How BSW Started                  

•        Pratt Elementary School with high need in a low resource area  
•     CIGNA corporation agreed to the innovative solution

How BSW Works

•        Littles (mentees) leave school during their lunch hour
•        Meet with their Bigs (mentors) at the corporation
•        One hour every week or every other week

Two Crucial Components

•        Strong Partnership with Corporation                                      
•        Strong Partnership with School

Create & Support the Corporate Partnership

•          Functional responsibilities – Create an MOU
•          Corporate liaison
•          Logistics of program
•  Set day/time of program
• Discuss meeting space availability
• Balance of planned events vs. one-to-one unstructured time

Volunteer Engagement

•          Information Session for Employees
• Work with liaison to determine best way to recruit
• Process and logistics of session

•          Intake Process
• Application Process
• Interviews on-site

•      Volunteer Orientation

Create and Support School Partnership

•          School with students who need mentors
•          Infrastructure to support program
•          Selection process
• Research demographics and needs of children
• Research distance

Introductory Meeting

•          Meet with principal and/or vice principal
• Determine school liaison(s)
• Discuss liaison responsibilities
• Determine structure of program
• Discuss district/school permissions/requirements

•       Confirm date/time of program (including school calendar)
• Schedule meeting with school liaison
• Recruitment of Littles (mentees)
• In-school interviews
• Reinforce program details and expectations
• Training for Littles (mentees)
• Discuss on-going match support processes [This can be done by the mentoring liaisons if not part of a BBBS organization.]

Photos from the BSW Presentation

First Match Meeting Day

•          Logistics
• Bigs’ (mentors’) meeting
• Arrival of Littles (mentees)
• T-shirts and name tags

•          Puzzle pieces

•          Required paperwork

Best Practice: Check-in conference calls

Best Practice: Cousin matches

The BSW Program’s Impact: It’s Helped Us

•          Serve kids in harder to reach areas
•          Provide exposure to workplace environment
•          Increase corporate volunteerism
•          Identify dedicated funding

Impact on Children

Children mentored by Beyond School Walls Bigs (Mentors):

•          Improved their focus at school
•          Improved their grades
•          Believed that their Bigs (mentors) were important to them
•          Experienced a positive change in attitudes or perceptions
•          Enjoyed the program

“I used to want to be a teacher. Now I want to be a president of a company.”                     

Beyond School Walls Little

Impact on Employees

•         96% agree that the program has positively impacted them
•         90% enjoyed interacting with their Littles (mentees)
•         83% are more likely to work for a firm that has a reputation for volunteering in the community
•          85% plan to continue their mentorship beyond the first year
•          93% would recommend the program to colleagues

Note: In this post, we did omit challenges of the area in order to focus on the program model.

End of Part I of the Beyond School Walls adaptable model

Excerpts from the presentation PowerPoint                                                                      

National Mentoring Summit 2012, Washington, DC DC                                                                         1-25-12

Corporate Campus Mentoring Program Overview - BSW

In 2012 at the National Mentoring Summit in DC, an excellent presentation explained the Beyond School Walls mentoring program, a collaboration of Philadelphia's top businesses and Big Brothers Big Sisters of Southeast Pennsylvania. If schools cooperated, this model could be adapted to any city as a public-private partnership for elementary, middle and/or high schools. 

In essence, students are taken to corporate buildings to have on-site mentoring. 

To adapt in Oklahoma, the businesses would have to pay for buses and drivers and perhaps lunch, if done through lunch, or have school cafeterias pack brown bag lunches on mentoring days. A school liaison and a corporate one would coordinate the program between each school and company. This program is not limited to a Big Brothers Big Sisters organization. In Oklahoma City, many companies adopt a school. Be creative! We will be happy to consult.  

To read model specifics, see the March 22, 2014 blog post. 

From the website:

Imagine the possibilities... 

…a child’s eyes grow big with excitement as they enter a
   skyscraper for the first time.
…a boy looks forward to school because he will visit his mentor.
…a student says that she wants to be a CEO.
…an employee returns to his desk energized by an hour with his mentee.

What will you start at your company or school?

School-Based Mentoring with a Twist!
Beyond School Walls is a version of Big Brothers Big Sisters’ (BBBS) blue-ribbon one-to-one youth mentoring program. Through a partnership with BBBS SEPA, companies like Comcast, Exelon Generation and Urban Outfitters give back to the community by hosting children from a nearby school at their corporate office. The children meet in the workplace with the employee volunteer mentor two to four times per month during the school day for about an hour. A BBBS SEPA Match Support Specialist manages the program on-site while Bigs and Littles play games, do arts and crafts, tour the office or just talk with one another. BBBS SEPA launched the Beyond School Walls program in 2005 and currently has 21 corporate partners participating in the program.

What are the benefits for the child?BBBS SEPA's Beyond School Walls program introduces children to jobs at an early age, giving them an opportunity to learn about the corporate world first-hand. Through relationships with "Corporate Bigs", Littles experience what it means to work for a corporation and the educational requirements needed to achieve this professional success.

At Wawa's headquarters in Delaware County, Littles and Bigs can take a walk to the farm to visit dairy cows. At CIGNA, it's a weekly lunch in a skyscraper that most Littles in the program never imagined visiting.

The value is the same: children are exposed to professional environments, new career paths and life goals are introduced, and lives are truly changed.

“We don’t want to reinvent the wheel in our community investment programs, so we look for strong partners who have excellent programs. This is the single best program that we have been able to partner with.”
- David L. Cohen, Executive Vice President, Comcast

“I used to want to be a teacher. Now I want to be a president of a company.”
- Beyond School Walls Little Sister

“I constantly tell friends, family, neighbors, contacts about the Beyond School Walls program.”
- Beyond School Walls Big

Partners

To learn more about starting a Beyond School Walls program, contact Wes Enicks, Development Director, at wenicks@bbbssepa.org or 215.790.9200.

http://www.bbbssepa.org/site/c.8rJNK0MHJjLYH/b.6299407/k.F510/Beyond_School_Walls.htm

Ret. 3-18-14

Form: Mentee's Point of View

This excerpt may be helpful to use but also to share with mentors and discuss in mentor training. 

GAUGING THE EFFECTIVENESS OF YOUTH MENTORING QUESTIONNAIRE

Questions

1.  When something is bugging me, my mentor listens to me.

2.  My mentor has lots of good ideas about how to solve a problem.

3.  My mentor helps me take my mind off things.

4.  Sometimes my mentor promises that we will do something and then we don’t do it.

5.      My mentor makes fun of me in ways that I don’t like.

6.      I wish my mentor were different.

7.      When I am with my mentor, I feel disappointed.

8.      When I am with my mentor, I feel ignored.

9.      When I am with my mentor, I feel bored.

10.  When I am with my mentor, I feel mad.

11.  I feel that I can’t trust my mentor with secrets because I am afraid that he or she would tell my parent/guardian.

12.  When my mentor gives me advice, he or she makes me feel stupid.

13.  I wish my mentor asked me more about what I think.

14.  I wish my mentor knew me better.

15.  I wish my mentor spent more time with me.

Four additional columns on the right had headings for evaluation, but the focus in this post is on striving for a quality relationship.

Strongly Agree

Agree

Disagree

Strongly Disagree

Courtesy of Jean Rhodes, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology, University of Massachusetts, Boston, cited in “Gauging the Effectiveness of Youth Mentoring,” Research Corner Mentoring.org. 

www.mentoring.org/downloads/mentoring_622.doc   Ret. 3-11-14

On Self-Control: Marshmallow Test

blogs.smithsonianmag.com

This post is more of a reminder of why to instill self-control rather than the tool to use.

Psychology

The Secrets of Self-Control: The Marshmallow Test 40 Years Later

By Maia Szalavitz @maiasz Sept. 06, 2011

Ever wonder why your willpower fails you just when you need it most? The results of a new long-term study, which first began more than 40 years ago with the now-famous marshmallow test in preschoolers, may offer some clues.

In the late 1960s, researchers submitted hundreds of four-year-olds to an ingenious little test of willpower: the kids were placed in a small room with a marshmallow or other tempting food and told they could either eat the treat now, or, if they could hold out for another 15 minutes until the researcher returned, they could have two.

Most children said they would wait. But some failed to resist the pull of temptation for even a minute. Many others struggled a little longer before eventually giving in. The most successful participants figured out how to distract themselves from the treat’s seduction — by turning around, covering their eyes or kicking the desk, for instance — and delayed gratification for the full 15 minutes.

Follow-up studies on these preschoolers found that those who were able to wait the 15 minutes were significantly less likely to have problems with behavior, drug addiction or obesity by the time they were in high school, compared with kids who gobbled the snack in less than a minute. The gratification-delayers also scored an average of 210 points higher on the SAT.
Scientists have now continued this research with a subgroup of 60 participants, now in their 40s, whose level of self-control remained stable from childhood into adulthood. (The study does not include those who struggled to delay gratification early on, but learned to master temptation as they matured.)

seekyt.com

The authors, led by B.J. Casey, professor of developmental psychobiology at Cornell University, wanted to know whether the kids who couldn’t wait to get the treat, the “low delayers,” would show an underlying inability to exert self-control in adulthood, or whether their self-discipline failed only in certain, emotionally charged cases. “Is it the case that these individuals have difficulty controlling their impulses or is it also due to sensitivity to just how alluring the cues are?” Casey says.

The researchers also wanted to see if low-delaying adults showed differences in brain activity compared with those who had greater self-control.

Participants were asked to perform two versions of a computer task. In one version, the volunteers had to press a button when they saw an image of either a male or a female face bearing a neutral expression. Those who were first asked to identify male faces would eventually be switched to identifying female faces (and vice versa), which required participants to suppress their impulse to respond to the previously correct answer. This test measured people’s ability to exert self-control in the absence of emotional material.

In the second, emotionally “hot” version of the test, people were asked to press a button in response to a happy or fearful face. Previous research has shown that people find seeing happy faces rewarding — so the researchers expected low delayers to have trouble preventing their responses to them when required. Indeed, the high delayers were significantly better at not pressing the button when a smiling face flashed on the screen.

Researchers also scanned the brains of 26 of the participants while they completed both tests. They found that high delayers showed more activity than low delayers in a region of the prefrontal cortex associated with impulse and behavior control, particularly while completing the task involving emotionally charged expressions. Meanwhile, low delayers showed more activation of a deeper region of the brain associated with pleasure, desire and addiction, especially in response to the happy faces.

You might say that high delayers have better mental brakes, while low delayers are driven by a stronger engine. “The low delayers don’t tend to activate the prefrontal cortex as much as the high delayers do. The high delayers are very effective at being able to regulate their behavior and not activating this deep system,” Casey says. “There’s not as much of a push-and-pull for the high delayers.”

But the differences emerged primarily when people were faced with “hot,” emotional cues, not when they had to choose between neutral faces. That suggests that low delayers aren’t globally unable to control impulses, like people with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD); rather, they have trouble stopping themselves in the context of particular temptations.

“What the [researchers] found is that their 11 participants who had lifelong low self-control did not have a problem with controlling their brains’ actions in ordinary circumstances,” notes Terrie Moffitt, professor of psychology and neuroscience at Duke University, who was not associated with the study. “Instead, their distinctive brain activity started to emerge only when something alluring and rewarding was shown to them.”
Moffitt says she has had similar results in her own study of 1,000 people whom she followed from age 3 to 38.

Both Moffitt and Casey stress that low delayers don’t lack general intelligence and that they have qualities that are extremely important to society. In uncertain times, delaying gratification can be the wrong choice, and people who follow their emotional impulses can become great explorers or entrepreneurs. (Apple’s Steve Jobs is a classic example).

But there’s no doubt that low delayers can also get into serious trouble. Moffitt describes one such participant who told her, “Believe me, I understand all about saving for retirement, but I haven’t saved any money because when I see a hot motorcycle, I buy it!”

But there’s nothing that says low delayers can’t change. Moffitt’s research has found that in fact, childhood self-control isn’t very strongly correlated with adult self-mastery. For example, the “correlation between participants’ rank on IQ tests from childhood to adulthood is .70 on a scale from -1 (total change) to +1 (total stability). That’s stable!” Moffitt says. “But the same correlation for self-control skills is only .30, indicating that many people change as they grow up, and fewer people remain stable.”

Previous work with the preschoolers and the marshmallow test showed that high-delaying kids often found success not only by distracting themselves from tempting situations but also by reframing them to lower their emotional temperature. For example, they would imagine that the marshmallow was a cloud or just a picture of a marshmallow instead of an actual edible treat.

Perhaps these same techniques can be employed in other situations. “What this study may suggest is that we should inform people about ways in which we can ‘cool down’ the ‘hot’ cues for those individuals who have the most difficulty suppressing actions toward them,” Casey says.

The research was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Maia Szalavitz is a health writer for TIME.com. Find her on Twitter at @maiasz. You can also continue the discussion on TIME Healthland‘s Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIMEHealthland.

Read more: The Secrets of Self-Control: The Marshmallow Test 40 Years Later | TIME.com http://healthland.time.com/2011/09/06/the-secrets-of-self-control-the-marshmallow-test-40-years-later/#ixzz2vbJrNxPm

Ret. 3-10-14

Life Lessons from Dr. Seuss

'Appropriate for all ages! 

Happy 110th Birthday! 18 of Dr. Seuss's Most Inspiring Quotes 

March 1, 2014 – 5:15 AM 

By Vi-An Nguyen @vian_nguyen

(PRNewsFoto/Storyopolis Fine Art/AP Images)

Dr. Seuss poses with models of some
 of his characters. Getty Images.

Today, we’re celebrating the 110th birthday of Theodor Geisel—you may know him as Dr. Seuss. The prolific children’s book author was born on March 2, 1904, and his mark on kids’ literature was so indelible, the National Education Association created National Read Across America Day (which will be celebrated on March 3 this year) in honor of the day.

Dr. Seuss passed away in 1991 at age 87, but new generations of children still learn to read—and learn to flex their imaginations—with his unforgettable characters and rhymes to this day. That’s why we’re marking his birthday with some of his most inspiring quotes. Some are drawn from his books and others from interviews, but they’re all equally worth remembering today.

Also below are some of Dr. Seuss’s planning sketches from a few of his beloved books. For more, check out Seussville.com.

You can see the Cat in the Hat take shape in this preliminary
drawing circa 1958. (Courtesy of Suessville.com)

1. “You have brains in your head, you have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose.”

2. “Today is your day! Your mountain is waiting so get on your way!”

3. “You’re on your own. And you know what you know. And you’re the one who’ll decide where to go.”

4. “Oh, the things you can find if you don’t stay behind!”

5. “Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple.”

Even in early sketches, Sam did not like
green eggs and ham. (Courtesy of Suessville.com)

6. “Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It’s not.”

7. “Today you are you, that is truer than true. There is no one alive who is youer than you.”

8. “The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.”

9. “A person’s a person, no matter how small.”

10. “I have heard there are troubles of more than one kind. Some come from ahead and some come from behind. But I’ve bought a big bat. I’m all ready you see. Now my troubles are going to have troubles with me!”

Even Dr. Suess's rough sketches are
enchanting. (Courtesy of Suessville.com)

11. “So be sure when you step. Step with care and great tact and remember that life’s a Great Balancing Act.”

12. “Will you succeed? Yes! You will, indeed! (98 and ¾ percent guaranteed.)”

13. “If things start happening, don’t worry. Don’t stew. Just go right along. You’ll start happening too.”

14. “Today was good. Today was fun. Tomorrow is another one.”

Another sketch from "Green Eggs and
Ham." (Courtesy of Suessville.com)

15. “Oh the things you can find if you don’t stay behind!”

16. “If you never did you should. These things are fun, and fun is good.”

17. “With your head full of brains and your shoes full of feet, you’re too smart to go down any not-so-good street.”

18. “You’re on your own. And you know what you know. And you are the guy who’ll decide where to go.”

http://parade.condenast.com/266097/viannguyen/happy-110th-birthday-15-of-dr-seusss-most-inspiringquotes/ utm_source=parademagazine &utm_medium=print &utm_campaign= vanity20140309  

Ret. 3-10-14

Published 3-18-14

High School Students: Preparing for Life Each Year of High School

[Although every student is not immediately going to college after graduation, every student needs a postsecondary plan, developed and tweaked before graduation. Two previously explored, helpful websites for college planning are:

http://www.okcollegestart.org/Home.aspx and https://bigfuture.collegeboard.org/ ]

Go to http://www.mappingyourfuture.org/GuideToLife/ to customize your own plan for life after high school.

Get prepared for life after high school

Some people know from an early age exactly what they want to be when they are adults — and how they can get there. Others aren't sure of their plans, and that's okay too.

Regardless of what you want to be, you most likely will be heading toward higher education of some kind, and our Guide to Life after High School can help you prepare. You'll learn about careers, academic preparation for college, how to pay for college, and managing your financial life after high school graduation. You will need about 25 minutes to complete a guide.

To complete an interactive guide, you must be at least 13 years of age. In addition, your school or educator instructing you to complete the guide must elect to participate.

If you are under the age of 13 or your school/educator doesn't participate, you can read a printable guide linked below.

To begin the interactive guide, provide your date of birth:

Month                                                                 January                                                             February                                                             March                                                             April                                                             May                                                             June                                                             July                                                             August                                                             September                                                             October                                                             November                                                             December                                                           Day                                                                 1                                                             2                                                             3                                                             4                                                             5                                                             6                                                             7                                                             8                                                             9                                                             10                                                             11                                                             12                                                             13                                                             14                                                             15                                                             16                                                             17                                                             18                                                             19                                                             20                                                             21                                                             22                                                             23                                                             24                                                             25                                                             26                                                             27                                                             28                                                             29                                                             30                                                             31                                                           Year                                                                201420132012201120102009200820072006200520042003200220012000199919981997199619951994199319921991199019891988198719861985198419831982198119801979197819771976197519741973197219711970196919681967196619651964196319621961196019591958195719561955195419531952195119501949194819471946194519441943194219411940193919381937193619351934193319321931193019291928192719261925192419231922192119201919191819171916                                                          I certify the above date of birth is true and correct.

Printable guides
 

• Guide to Life after High School: Freshman Year
• Guide to Life after High School: Sophomore Year
• Guide to Life after High School: Junior Year
• Guide to Life after High School: Senior Year

Educators

Mapping Your Future is a national collaborative, public-service, nonprofit organization that provides career, college, financial aid, and financial literacy services to students, families, and schools. Our information and tools help you provide effective service to your students and families, especially as they explore higher education as a means to a better future.

The Guide to Life after High School program is a FREE service for students, schools, and educators. Sign up for an Online Education account so you can use the Guide to Life after High School program now or learn more!

Ret. 3-3-14