Mentorship

Back in the day young people were constantly interacting with older mentors in the work setting.  Blue Collar jobs in mines or factories provided them opportunities to interact with adults who had careers in these jobs.  This mentorship provided youth with important modeling of behavior.  It also created relationships with adults other than their parents who could hold them accountable to their actions or help them to set boundaries in many areas of life.  These jobs were places youth could create a career; it was a stepping stone for a living wage. 

If you look at the jobs that teenagers have today, most them are in the service sector.  They could also be described as dead-end, unskilled jobs.  In high school, most of my friends who had jobs worked as lifeguards, camp counselors, or in fast food.  In many of these positions all of the employees are around the same age except for supervisors and managers.  Also many of these jobs are not in areas that teens hope to create a career; let alone receive a living wage. 

See: The Way We Really Are by Stephanie Coontz

I believe in the importance of mentorship and strong adult allies in the lives of young people.  It is possible that a decline in mentorship could be attributed to the change in the job market.  Young people spend more time with other youth rather than creating relationships that cross generational lines.  

I started thinking about this topic as we are creating a Job Shadowing Program that will be launched in 2010.  Hopefully this program will provide a few students with the opportunity of creating positive relationships with adults.  Although these relationships will be fairly short time, the experience of being in an office setting where most employees are older than themselves will have an impact on the youth.  It’ll be interesting to see the results of this program.

More to come...

Do you see the presence of mentors in the lives of young people?  Do you think mentors are important?  How do youth find adult allies and how do we promote mentorship?