Engaging in advocacy - local youth visit Beacon Hill!

January was National Mentoring Month, and young people from the Berkshires had a chance to make their voices heard in support of mentoring far outside the county - on Beacon Hill! Berkshire United Way supported a field trip for youth and adults involved in two of our funded programs, Railroad Street Youth Project’s RSYP Mentoring Program and Berkshire Children and Families’ Pittsfield Community Connection (PCC), to tell their stories about the positive impact of mentoring at the Massachusetts State House. 

Mentoring plays an important role in our work with young people – increasing high school graduation rates, reducing teenage pregnancy, and ensuring young people have the support they need to graduate high school with a college or career plan. We currently invest in four local mentoring programs; last year, those programs connected 281 young people with a caring adult.

Youth Mentoring Day is an annual advocacy day at the State House, sponsored by Mass Mentoring Partnership. A total of 15 mentees met with their respective Representatives, Tricia Farley-Bouvier of Pittsfield and Smitty Pignetelli of south county as well as Adam Hinds’ team to advocate for the mentoring line item in the state budget. This funding helps support mentoring programs across the state.  

Deonte, a mentee in the PCC program, told Tricia Farley-Bouvier, “I’ve been with the program for a few years. It really helped me because in the beginning, I was not on the best path, I wasn’t hanging out with the best crowd. But PCC and my mentors helped me with school and applying to college. I just found out I got accepted – I’m not sure where I’m going yet. But I’m really happy to be on that path now.”

So why mentor? Research confirms that quality mentoring relationships have powerful positive effects on young people. Ultimately, mentoring connects a young person to personal growth and development, and social and economic opportunity. Yet one in three young people will grow up without this critical asset (source: mentoring.org).

To view a list of mentor opportunities in the Berkshires, visit this link and simply type in your zip code to view programs in your area.  You may also reach out to me to learn more about mentoring opportunities at ktoomey@berkshireunitedway.org ; 413-442-6948 x 15. I hope to hear from you!

Kat Toomey

Coordinator of Positive Youth Development

Making a positive impact

 When you give to Berkshire United Way, your gift is part of a collective that impacts our community in a way that no single person, program or organization can do alone.

I’d like to provide a glimpse of just one of the many ways you made an impact in the Berkshires. 287 youth were matched with a mentor last year - mentoring provides teens with a caring adult who acts as a positive role model, helping them to navigate those critical formative years and make healthy decisions that will lead to high school graduation and a career or college plan.

Mentoring in action at the Railroad Street Youth Project.

One young man, we’ll call him Jack, was struggling to remain in school; he was combative with teachers, school administration and some peers, resulting in a couple of school suspensions and being held back from class field trips.

In an effort to intervene he was matched with a mentor, but right out of the gate he let the mentor coordinator know, he was only interested in playing basketball.

As time progressed, he became an active member in various group activities and games and even attended multiple field trips. With the help of his mentor, his peer relationship skills developed, and he demonstrated positive growth in his relationships with his peers and school and even earned a field trip to Boston.

This is just one story, and mentoring only represents one strategy we are implementing in our positive youth development work. Currently we are investing over $575,000 in quality youth programming.  We could not do this without you. On behalf of our community partners, friends and neighbors throughout the Berkshires, thank you.

Duffy Judge
Development Manager

Mentoring Matters

In November, I had the privilege of attending Mass Mentoring Partnership’s Decade in Western Massachusetts, an event celebrating the people and partners who have worked to create empowering youth-adult relationships throughout this region.  

As part of the celebratory program, two mentors were recognized for having outstanding relationships with their mentees, and making an incredible impact on their lives. As I listened to their stories, I was struck by how important it is for every young person to have a caring adult in their life, yet there are young people here in our own back yard who need, perhaps even seek, a mentor in their life.

Whether mentoring pairs meet daily or once a week, there’s something to be gained by the positive relationships that evolve. In fact, young people who are mentored often go on to be become mentors and role models themselves, contributing not only to their success, but to the success of future generations.

Mentoring plays an important role in Berkshire United Way’s positive youth development work and we were among twenty Difference Makers recognized by Mass Mentoring for supporting mentoring activities across the region.

Trevon, a participant in the Pittsfield Community Connection Mentoring Program, poses with his mentor, Dana. 

Dana, a mentor in the Pittsfield Community Connection program at Berkshire Children and Families, one of the mentoring programs supported by Berkshire United Way, could easily have been one of the two mentors honored by Mass Mentoring.  She and her mentee, Trevon, talk a bit about their relationship below.

What would you say to someone who was thinking about joining a mentoring program?

Trevon: “I would say, just do it. I enjoy having that extra support around in my life, and to help me with questions. What I like about Dana is she’s soft-spoken (sometimes) and it’s good to have her in my corner, and I know she’s there with me for a long time.”

What advice would you give to someone thinking about becoming a mentor?

Dana: “I would tell them it’s just a lot of fun, and it gets you out of your own box and bubble and doing things that I wouldn’t be doing because I’ve already done them, but now I get to relive them again.

It can be a little intimidating because you may feel like you need to be a ‘finished’ person or a ‘perfect’ person and you need to have tons of resources and it’s not true, we’re all flawed people and it’s definitely been paying off for me and now I have a friend for life.”

January is National Mentoring Month.  To learn more about how you can make a difference by mentoring, please contact me at ktoomey@berkshireunitedway.org or 413.442.6948 x15.

Kat Toomey 

Coordinator of Positive Youth Development.