Mentor Program Essay

Mentors are people who provide support, strength, and inspiration. Many people have a mentor in their life that they aspire to be like, and seek out for guidance. Mentors play a big role in many lives, including Junior's from The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie. Some of the biggest mentors for Junior are his parents, his Wellpinit teacher Mr. P and his Rearden basketball coach. If it weren't for these mentors inspiration and support, Junior wouldn't have taken some of the risks he does.

This study is limited to the freshman mentor program at one high school in a 30 high school district located in Maryland. Data was collected from a representative group of mentors. Interviews were limited to discussion of the role of the mentor in working with the freshmen mentees. Although many high schools have freshmen mentor programs, each school develops a unique program to fit the needs of the students feeding into their school. Data was collected from a small representative group of mentors and they were all

Mentors should reflect confidence, hope, optimism, and resiliency as well as the ability to promote others and their strengths. This sounds uncannily like the descriptions of an authentic leader that we have been reading about in our literature.

Clutterbuck & Megginson (1999, p.17) describe mentoring as being like ‘standing in front of a mirror with a trusted other, who can help you see things that you do not know how to see, or that have become too familiar for you to notice’. It is a helping relationship between an individual with potential and an individual with expertise. This multi-dimensional relationship is a partnership between those in similar roles, who can support each other. A number of roles of the mentor have been listed by Bolton (2010, p.193): role model, enabler, teacher, encourager, counsellor, befriender, facilitator, coach, confidante, supporter and ‘un-learner’. To be successful roles and responsibilities of those involved need to be clear and they need to be matched to each other and understand expectations of them.

“The greatest good you can do for another is not just share your riches but to reveal to him his own. - Benjamin Disrael This quote is similar to a Chinese Proverb that says “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime”(Chinese Proverb). Both essentially say the same thing, and that is, you can only help someone so much until they need to realize they are capable of doing great things on their own. Higher Risk youth benefit from guidance, but once they have figured everything out they can move on alone. These two quotes apply to mentoring because, mentoring is like showing someone the way to life.

An advantage of mentoring is that it helps to acclimatise less successful workers to the job and organisational requirements. By having a "go to" person to ask questions, discuss scenarios and generally learn the nuances of the company, the mentee can become a productive member much more quickly and never feel that he has nowhere to turn for help. The mentee can gain the sense of achievement that comes from the mentor's feedback and assessment of his progress. The mentee's quest to gain the mentor's approval can serve as a motivating force to continue to improve his performance. The mentor can gain satisfaction from knowing that she is helping an individual and can take a measure of pride in her accomplishments. For a mentor that has already achieved a great deal of success, she can look at the process as a way of "giving back”.

What does a mentor do? It gives advice. The mythological archetype is the I picked was mentor. Mythological is imaginary and fictitious, and archetype is the original pattern or model from which all things of the same kind are copied. In the novel Tangerine, Luis is the mentor in three ways.

"Mentoring is a special quality, skill set and attitude," she says. "The benefits are not only between the mentor and mentee, but the future generations."

We often meet wise people who we trust to guide us. Some consider these individuals to be mentors because they support or influence us in a special way. A mentor can be anyone, such as a someone who guides you through a tough job, or even your mom and dad! What makes all these people similar is that they all have likeable qualities. The qualities that I think make a good mentor are patience, determination, and a good-listener.

It takes a lot of commitment to be a mentor, an appropriate meeting time needs to be discussed between mentor and mentee so that it doesn't conflict with family, school, and/or social life. Mentors are usually provided for: troubled teens, young children with busy parents that work, children or teens with special needs such as Autism or ADHD, or anyone under or over the age of 18 who needs to have one on one time with someone they trust and can talk to confidentially.

I believe a good mentor should have the ultimate goal of successfully teaching the student, meanwhile, guiding them properly in a manner in which he/she learns by themselves. In the National Honors Society, I have participated in a program called “Mustang Buddies”.

Mentoring for the mentor is about challenging himself to perform to greater capabilities while nurturing a mentee and stretching them to realise their full potential. Mentors counsel, tutor and guide their mentees in developing themselves.

Functions provided by a mentor include both career oriented and psychosocial. Career oriented functions are done to “enhance career advancement” of the protégé (Greenhaus et al 2010). Career functions include sponsorship, increased exposure and visibility, coaching, protection, and challenging but doable assignments. Psychosocial functions are done to “enhance sense of competence and effectiveness” of the protégé (Greenhaus, 2010, p 212). These functions involve being a role model, providing acceptance and confirmation, being a counselor, and providing

Learning mentors tend to work on a one to one level or in small numbered groups, a learning mentor must be a good listener, be able to encourage and motivate and act as a role model and encourage the build up of a mutually respectful relationship (Hayward, 2001).

With the development of the more organic and less formal organisational structures the role of mentors has shifted with these changes. Unlike previously where mentors where seen as formal trainers who taught newcomers the processes and got them acquainted with the cultures and the systems within the organisation. Which required good interpersonal skills and a good knowledge of the activity or tasks the mentee would have to undertake, and be able to effectively relay or demonstrate the tasks or activities to the mentee. As opposed to more recently where a mentor would have to be more of an emotional counselor and demonstrate more skills than were traditionally required from