January is National Mentoring Month, and the CU One-to-One Mentoring program is looking for a few good mentors, especially men. And no, they aren’t trying to be sexist here, there just tends to be an uneven men to women ratio amongst the mentors in Champaign and Urbana, and there are just as many boys that could benefit from a mentor as there are girls. Mentors spend an hour a week with their mentee, a student in 3rd grade through high school in the Unit 4 and District 116 school districts.
Some stats from CU One-to-One:
Research confirms that with a mentor, at-risk youth are:
- 52% less likely than their peers to skip a day of schools
- 55% more likely to be enrolled in college
- 81% more likely to participate in sports or extracurricular activities
- 78% more likely to volunteer regularly in their communities
- 130% more likely to hold leadership positions
The program has a goal of recruiting 50 more male mentors, though they are always welcoming to more women as well. The next training is January 29th from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. at Urbana Middle School. If you are interested in attending, contact:
Champaign Schools: Lauren Smith, 351-3722, smithla@u4sd.org
Urbana Schools: Thomas Howley, 384-3685, thowley@usd116.org
Photo from Facebook
