parents as partners - mentor · parents as partners •vital resource and partner in mentoring ......
Post on 23-Jul-2018
215 Views
Preview:
TRANSCRIPT
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Parents as Partners Research and Strategies for Engaging Parents in Youth
Mentoring Programs
May 15, 2014
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Good to Know…
After the webinar, all attendees receive:
Instructions for how to access PDF of presentation slides and webinar recording
Link to the Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series webpage, where all slides, recordings, and resources are posted.
Please help us out by answering survey questions at the end of the webinar.
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
• All attendees muted for best sound
• Type questions and comments in the question box
• Respond to polls
• Who is with us today?
Participate in Today’s Webinar
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Today’s Webinar
• Andrea Taylor, Ph.D. (Temple University)
• Renee Spencer, Ph.D. (Boston University)
• Antoinette Basualdo-Delmonico, Ph.D. (Boston University)
Q & A throughout the presentation (use the Q & A panel)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Andrea Taylor, Ph.D.
Director of Training Temple University’s Intergenerational Center The Center provides training and technical assistance focused on building the capacity of non-profit organizations to infuse intergenerational approaches into service delivery and engaging people 50+ in connecting and contributing to their communities. Dr. Taylor is the developer of the evidenced based intergenerational mentoring program, Across Ages. She has provided training and technical assistance to over 100 sites across the country that have replicated the Across Ages model.
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Renee Spencer, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Boston University School of Social Work
Renee received her MSW from UT Austin and her EdD from the Harvard University Graduate School of Education. Her research interests include youth mentoring, adolescent development, and gender. Much of her research focuses on the relational processes at work in more and less successful youth mentoring relationships. She has published widely and her work has been funded by the William T. Grant Foundation (Scholar Award) and the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP).
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Antoinette Basualdo-Delmonico, Ph.D.
Lecturer School of Social Work at Boston University Antoinette is involved in youth mentoring research and currently conducting a multi-state mentoring evaluation project focused on military families. Her research emphasis is on understanding the role that parents play in the youth mentoring relationship and has provides trainings to youth mentoring programs on family engagement. She has experience working with adolescents and families in schools and community-based organizations. Antoinette earned her PhD in Social Work and Sociology from Boston University.
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Basics of Family Engagement in Mentoring
• An often overlooked aspect of running a mentoring program
• “Essential tensions” around perceptions in youth mentoring
– Parents “create” needs and “barriers” for mentoring
– Parents influence and facilitate benefits of mentoring
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Another view…
MENTOR
WORKER PARENT/ FAMILY
YOUTH
(Keller, 2005)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Parents as Partners
• Vital resource and partner in mentoring relationships
• What does this partnership look like in action?
• What are the opportunities and barriers?
We want to hear form you on this topic today!
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Theories on Family Involvement
From the Handbook of Youth Mentoring (2nd Ed.) • Parental acceptance theory –Youth need this
before they can seek support from adults outside the home (Rohner & Britner, 2002)
• Family systems theory – Family dynamics and interactions influence individuals’ external relations (Kerr & Bowen, 1988)
• Systemic mentoring theory – Cohesive alliance of multiple caring adults is what is needed to produce outcomes (Keller, 2005)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Research on Parent Involvement
When parents are mentioned:
– Talked about by others, usually negatively
• Potential for sabotage
• Mentors as compensatory
– Serve as reporter of youth outcomes
– Parent-child relationship as an outcome of mentoring
• Parent perspective and experiences are largely absent (Taylor& Porcellini, 2014)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
3 Types of Family Involvement
• Youth and Family Mentoring
• Youth-Only + Family Skill-Building
• Youth-Only + Family Activities
(Taylor & Porcellini, 2014)
Poll: Which type is your program?
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Impact of Family Engagement
Across Ages: • Monthly social and recreational activities for all program
youth (MPS and PS);
• Program staff provided information about community resources; engaged parents in learning ways to effectively communicate with their children;
• Mentors reached out to parents to encourage attendance and help with transportation.
(Taylor and Porcellini, 2014)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Impact of Family Engagement
Across Ages:
• Parents interviewed regarding knowledge of the program, satisfaction with children’s participation and perception of program benefit.
• Parents of children in the MPS (full treatment) group more often expressed satisfaction with the program when the mentor reached out.
• Mentors reported increased satisfaction when they had access to parents.
(Taylor & Porcellini, 2014)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Impact of Family Engagement
Across Ages:
• Families of mentored youth reported:
Increased participation in school related activities;
Greater engagement in social/recreational activities as a family;
Increased awareness of community resources; and
More positive strategies for communicating with their children.
(Losciuto, Rajela, Townsend & Taylor, 1996)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Impact of Family Engagement
Cross-Age Mentoring Program (CAMP):
• Quarterly “Super Saturday” events
• Academic achievement mediated by improvements in mentee’s connectedness to parents
• Time spent at (and in transit to) program events increased parent-mentee interaction and bonding
• Events provide additional time with mentor
(Karcher, 2008, 2012)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
How do programs interact with parents?
Involving Engaging and Serving Collaborating
Primary Goal
Improve agency-family communication
Address needs of family to support mentoring relationship
Partner with parents in mentoring process
View of Families
Potential road blocks in the mentoring process
Challenged and in need of support and coaching
Experts on child, assets to be leveraged to support mentoring process
Practices *Gauge parental commitment
*Convey expectations and importance of parental role
*Involve parents in agency-sponsored events
*Involvement is responsibility of parent
*Reduce number of staff families interface with
*Build relationships with families (Home visits)
*Direct service to families *Broker relationships with
community resources *Coach families for good
reporting *Build support between
parents (e.g., PACs)
*Parent-mentor meet prior to mentor-youth match
*Stress importance parent and mentor communication
*Coach parents and mentors to increase mutual understanding
*Facilitate relationships between all parties involved in mentoring process
(Spencer & Basualdo-Delmonico, 2014)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Involving
“I stress to [parents] from the very beginning how important their role is.….We stress the safety issue,…’Okay. Make sure you find out from your child what they do.’ …. It shouldn’t be like when I call that one month you’re going to say, ‘Oh, I don’t know what they did.’ That’s something you should at least be armed with—information.”
(Spencer & Basualdo-Delmonico, 2014)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Engaging and Serving
“…healthy children can only grow up in healthy homes and healthy families…And most of our families are very, very challenged and we cannot disregard the substance abuse, mental health and domestic violence issues to say nothing of the extreme poverty that we’re seeing these days. We cannot disregard those and just look at the child, that simply does not work. So we have to deal with the entire family system… help …[them] identify… strengths and …challenges and to help them figure out how to meet some of those challenges.” (Spencer & Basualdo-Delmonico, 2014)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Collaborating
“We start from the perspective that all families have strengths and that they are our partners in this endeavor. ….we begin by helping the family identify their strengths. That’s always the jumping off point and that’s what helps us begin to establish a relationship with the family and then everything we do is built on that relationship. .… That philosophy then is part of every phase of the work we do.”
(Spencer & Basualdo-Delmonico, 2014)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Engagement Points
In what areas are families intentionally involved in your mentoring program and for what purpose? • Mentor selection • Orientation • Training • Match support • Closure process • Advisory capacity • Others?
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Power Dynamics with Parents
What mentoring often looks like…
YOUTH MENTOR PROGRAM
STAFF
• Ethnic minority • Growing up in
Poverty • From a single-
parent home
• White, non-Hispanic • Upper-class
background • College educated • No children at home
• White, non-Hispanic
• College educated
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Views of Low-Income Families
• Deficit Model (Valencia, 1997)
– Problem focused
– Problems are concentrated in the individual
• Strength-Based Approach (Saleeby, 2000)
– Focuses on assets of the individuals any supports that surround the individual
– Focus on building capacity and empowerment
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Reflections and Questions
• What questions do you have?
• What are your best strategies for engaging parents?
Next up: What do parents think about you?...
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Parent Hopes and Expectations
• Mentor-Child Relationship
– Additional positive adult role model
– Confidant
– Experiences and opportunities that broaden child’s sense of self and future
“I’d like my son to experience new things and kind of break out of his shell.”
(Spencer, Basualdo-Delmonico, & Lewis, 2011)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Parent Hopes and Expectations
• Parent-Mentor Relationship – Open, consistent communication
– Personal relationship
“I …got to meet him, and I got comfortable, and I liked the idea that they were gonna spend time together.… I could trust that he was not gonna steer my kid in the
wrong direction.”
“if she’s building this relationship with my daughter, then she’s gonna be part of this family, too.”
(Spencer, Basualdo-Delmonico, & Lewis, 2011)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Building Trust and Satisfaction
Clear commitment to mentoring relationship “Where I get upset, is if you’re disappointing my child, and you’re not
in communication with her and she’s asking me about you and I don’t know what to tell her. …that upsets me because it upsets her.”
Genuine positive regard and respect
“that level of conscientiousness really shows me that she respects my daughter”
Respect for parental guidelines
“I told her at any point in time she feels… that she’s [the child] gettin’ out of control, or gettin’ ready to escalate, just bring her
home. ... So she did.”
(Spencer, Basualdo-Delmonico, & Lewis, 2011)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Parent Roles: Collaborator
• Took an active role engaging in the mentoring relationship, working together with the mentor to help facilitate the development and promote the efficacy of the relationship “[the mentor] looks at… things in a different way.
Like if I come to [mentor] and I say to her, ‘Well, [child] has such and such a problem in this area. And she like, ‘Well, okay.’ She will say, ‘I’ll talk to her and stuff and then try to get things going and stuff.’ And then she’d come back and relate it to me and find out, you know,
we work as a team like too.”
(Spencer, Basualdo-Delmonico, & Lewis, 2011)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Parent Roles: Coach
• Offered guidance for relationship and even for younger mentor’s own lives
“(the mentor) kinda looking to me as, ‘Okay, what should I do here?’…it’s sort of,
um…makes me realize, Okay, well this is a person who’s a little bit younger and I really
have to be able to tell him what to do or expect. Because he’s a 19 year old.”
(Spencer, Basualdo-Delmonico, & Lewis, 2011)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Parent Roles: Mediator
• Took action to protect their child’s interests – attempting to preserve or in some cases end the relationship
“there was a period where she was not as, …as communicative as I would have hoped she’d been?...so, I talked to her about that….And, she was very apologetic, and she was very good about… you know, they haven’t seen each other every week ….But, she’s very good about calling.”
“[the mentor] did, at times, you know, have to work hard … but I just always told [child] I basically said, you know, ‘He’s a student and ….there’re gonna be many times when he’s just gonna be completely out, and you just gotta just wait and he’ll be back.’ So, I think the fact that I told him that reinforced his trust and he knew that it would work out ‘cause I said, ‘You know, you can call, but I believe this is what’s going on’ ”
(Spencer, Basualdo-Delmonico, & Lewis, 2011)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Parent-Mentor Relationships
• Working PM relationship – Mutual satisfaction with level of communication and
closeness (regardless of amount of communication or degree of closeness)
• Non-Working PM relationship – Both parent and mentor dissatisfied with level of
communication or degree of closeness – Disconnect between what they desire and what
they experience in the relationship
• Out-of-Sync PM relationship – One member satisfied while other dissatisfied with
PM communication or closeness
(Basualdo-Delmonico, 2013)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Working
“He became part of the family, he’s real down to earth,…[The mentor] would come in and he would talk,
he’d talk with everybody in the house … we had cook outs and [the mentor] was part of,…he was like family, …if we needed to go to the store he’d go to the store,
…like that, just like family.… “ (Parent)
“…the family was just really inviting and really, … very warm, very inviting, …just sort of the same connection I
had with [Little] is like almost instant connection with the family so it was kind of cool.“ (Mentor)
(Basualdo-Delmonico, 2013)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Not-Working
“…when [the mentor] wanted to take him to his home, we did tell him that he was welcome to
come over here. And that didn’t happen. ...he said he wanted to go make cookies… with him….if you wanna make cookies, you’re welcome to…come over here and make cookies, …opposed to going
someplace I’m not familiar with.” (Parent)
“…it always seemed like they didn’t really trust me,…I don’t know why” (Mentor)
(Basualdo-Delmonico, 2013)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Out-of-Sync
• “…the downside was that, he and I never really developed a rapport like we would touch base through email
regarding…times and things like that, but I never felt like,…I just got a sense that he was never interested in talking to me…. when he’d come he wouldn’t come up,
[my son would] just go down, he’d pull up and tell him to come down or something.’ (Parent)
• “…she seemed, uh... at first, I wasn’t sure if she liked me.
But, you know, it just seemed like that was her personality, to... to come off like that, ‘cause she’s been,
…super nice,…and pretty…laid back about the whole situation and,... that’s all I could really ask for, to tell you
the truth.” (Mentor) (Basualdo-Delmonico, 2013)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Polls!
Have you asked parents and mentors about their relationship with each other?
Which term describes most of your program’s relationships?
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Strategies & Recommendations
Understanding the program goals and mentor roles • Outreach to parents (orientation and
addressing barriers)
• One-on-one conversations about expectations
• Help parents reflect on their own mentors
• Provide opportunities for dialogue (Taylor & Porcellini, 2014)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Strategies & Recommendations
Building trust between mentors and parents • Help mentors and parents appreciate their mutual
interest in the child
• Train mentors on effective communication and respecting boundaries
• Address mentors’ and parents’ fears
• Educate mentors around working with special populations
(Taylor& Porcellini, 2014)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Strategies & Recommendations
Enhancing parents’ skills and confidence • Provide workshops to build parent skills (utilize partners)
• Conduct orientations for parents and mentors together
to facilitate knowledge sharing
• Train parents on managing their child’s challenging behavior
• Home visiting coaching and counselling (Taylor & Porcellini, 2014)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Strategies & Recommendations
Connecting families to resources
• Identify and map community resources for parents
• Connect families to case managers and family counselors when needed
(Taylor& Porcellini, 2014)
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Q&A
• What questions do you have?
• What’s working for you?
• Who are your key partners in this aspect of your program?
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Additional Resources
“Family Involvement” by Andrea Taylor and Lorraine Porcellini in Handbook of Youth Mentoring (2nd Ed.) Across Ages - http://acrossages.org/ CAMP (Super Saturdays) - http://michaelkarcher.com/CAMP_site.html Family Engagement: The Secret Sauce for Successful Youth Mentoring Programs • http://vimeo.com/86735102
• http://www.mentoring.org/2014_national_mentoring_summit/
workshops/all_workshops/family_engagement_the_secret_sauce_for_successful_youth_mentoring_programs
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Additional Resources
Parent & Family Engagement in Mentoring Staff Training Handbook http://massmentors.org/sites/default/files/Parent%20Engagement%20Handbook%20MMP%20Web.pdf New research: http://www.albany.edu/chsr/UnderstandingParentEngagementtoEnhanceMentoringOutcomes.shtml
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Remember…
After the webinar:
Please help us out by answering survey questions at the end of the webinar.
Everyone will get an email with information on how to
download the slides, recording, and resources on the CMWS webpage on the MENTOR website:
http://www.mentoring.org/program_resources/training_opportunities/collaborative_mentoring_webinar_series/
Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series
Access CMWS Information All Collaborative Mentoring Webinar Series information for upcoming and past webinars
is on the new CMWS webpage on the MENTOR website:
top related