Mentoring
“You have insights, ideas, tools, and meaningful objects that might not even seem important to you anymore. But for someone just starting out on their journey, these gifts could be life changing. Passing them on is what mentoring is all about.”
Often people can look back on their life and recognise someone who influenced them. It may have been a grandparent or a youth worker or teacher. For many cultures, there are ways of passing on traditions and knowledge so that new generations are nurtured.
Mentoring can be formal with an intentional programme to connect children or young people with someone older than them. It can also be informal and happen within family and whānau support networks.
People matter. According to Sticky Faith, young people thrive when they have at least five adults beyond their parents who make a significant investment in their lives.
Resources
‘The Power of Mentoring Children’: A free, downloadable booklet on mentoring children.
‘Five keys for Effective Mentoring’: A helpful article with good advice for mentoring young people.
St John’s in the City, Wellington, launched a mentoring programme as a result of attending a THRIVE facilitation. You can check out what they are doing here.
Mentoring Young People (Anglican, NZ)
The Mentoring Chain
In 2016, the Church of England conducted a research project looking at what helps young people stay rooted in their faith and church lives. You can read the full report here. When referring to the importance of mentoring, the feeling among respondents was that groups could create a mentoring chain within their church. Could a mentoring chain work in your church?
“Small groups can be led by a youth leaders who is just a little older than the group. In turn, this leader can be mentored by a slightly older person in the church, and so on - creating the kind of chain of intergenerational relationships advocated by many scholars in our literature review. However, as one respondent pointed out, “this requires no gaps in the chain of age groups for it to work”.
Exodus Prime:
Exodus Prime young leader training camp and mentorship programme from Scripture Union NZ equips young Christians (Yr 101-3) to be leaders of impact, today and in the future.