The mentoring partnership is a network that includes schools, churches, non-profits and businesses.
Mentors and their students enjoyed a baseball game last May in BostonSPRINGFIELD – The Republican and the Boston Celtics will be recognized by the Massachusetts Mentoring Partnership as the organization’s annual Champions of Mentoring.
The recognition at the partnership’s annual fund-raising event at Fenway Park on May 17 will honor both organizations for efforts to promote mentoring relationships between young people and adults.
The Champions of Mentoring breakfast event raised more than $220,000 last year, and this year’s goal is $250,000.
This year’s event will include an appearance by Celtics legend and Basketball Hall of Famer Bill Russell as the team’s Shamrock Foundation is honored. Boston Red Sox manager Terry Francona will also be making a special appearance as mentoring agency representatives from across the state will be honored later in the day during a Sox game.
The mentoring partnership is a statewide network that includes schools, religious organizations, community non-profits, and workplace mentoring programs for young people between the ages of 5 and 18.
The Champions of Mentoring award recognizes “individuals and organizations that have demonstrated a commitment to youth and have championed the strategic growth of high-quality mentoring throughout Massachusetts,” said David Shapiro, chief executive officer of Mass. Mentoring.
Shapiro said The Republican was selected for the honor for its work over the past three years which “has done a tremendous amount to spread the word throughout the region about the need for and power of mentors to make a difference in the lives of youth.”
“To be mentioned in the same breath as the Boston Celtics when it comes to supporting mentoring is quite an honor,” said Cynthia G. Simison, managing editor of The Republican. “The Republican has for decades worked to promote mentoring programs on its pages and to encourage our readers to understand the value of helping young people through volunteer programs like Big Brothers-Big Sisters. It is not something we do for recognition, but is indeed part of our mission to be good community partner. All of us benefit when these programs succeed.”
The Republican’s most recent efforts include a regular monthly feature on mentoring which appears in the Sunday Republican, along with a series of stories and columns published during National Mentoring Month each January and over the course of the rest of the year, according to Simison.
The mentoring partnership is nonprofit umbrella organization for mentoring groups such as Girls Inc. and Big Brothers Big Sisters. First-person columns by mentors and young people involved in mentoring program were among the highlights of this year’s effort by The Republican.
“You can think of (us) like a matchmaker,” said Katie L. Stebbins, Western Massachusetts director for the mentoring partnership, which also works with the region’s businesses, like Big Y Foods and MassMutual, to develop workplace mentoring programs. “We are available behind the scenes to help,” Stebbins said.
Mentoring projects cost about $1,000 a year to run per child, Stebbins said. That’s with volunteers doing the actual mentoring, meeting with students to talk about mutual interests and emphasize school attendance and education. “There is a lot of screening,” Stebbins said. “We do a lot of training.”
And the need is growing. In 2008, the partnership worked with 14 programs in Western Massachusetts. Last year, it had 27 programs totaling 1,613 youth between the ages of 6 and 24, in formal mentoring relationships, according to the partnership.
Joel Morse, director of partnership development at Big Brothers Big Sisters of Hampden County, said 90 percent of the students in his agency’s programs come from single-parent homes. “The need is always out there,” he said.
For more information go to www.massmentors.org and click on “News & Events” or phone Katie Stebbins (413) 796-2330 at the Western Massachusetts office.