MENTORS – Youth Navigators

COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT 2020

How might we support mentors in our community?

MENTORSHIP

The practice of mentorship is known to have the potential to positively impact the lives of youth. By sharing their time and skills, mentors can help support youth in many different ways. Mentors are important because of the knowledge and skills they pass on. They help youth see things from different perspectives that will benefit future growth and improvement.

Throughhout the summer of 2020, Youth Navigators engaged with youth in the community exploring the following questions.

Click on questions to find out what they learned! Want to contribute your thoughts on this topic? Take our survey below!

ENGAGEMENT TEAM:

ELYON TECLEMARIAM

HANAN MOHAMED

SARON KAHSAY

Q: Who in your community is a mentor and what do they do?

People responded by explaining how the majority of the mentors that they listed were from their cultural communities and how the mentors played a role in improving people’s lives and helping others with issues. They serve as role models in the community. Many listed personal traits that mentors provided to them personally and to the community as a whole. A common response was “relationship building skills” and “encouraging”. Based on the responses we can conclude that what people look for in mentors is one who is ready to take on challenges and be there for their mentee no matter what.

What I learned from the responses is that people see mentorship potential in individuals who are selfless, and do anything they can for others. A new question these responses sparked for me was how do you think mentors can pass on their skills to encourage others to become mentors? Having a discussion with the mentors would be helpful to learn more from them. I think we could share these learnings with the community to improve relationship building and mentoring to continue to support these mentors.

Q: How do mentorship relationships form?

Mentorship relationships form through other mutual relationships and a general similarity in hobbies or activities. They form through trust, time and knowledge they have gained that they are able to pass on to the mentee. Through motivation and inspiration to help or to learn and teach, trust would be formed and a mentorship relationship begins. Some people answered the question of how mentorship relationships form with similar great answers like trust with a strong explanation “If there is no trust, it can cause difficulty in building a strong relationship”.

By being trustworthy opens up those being mentored to become more comfortable to speak and express their questions or concerns. Also having time is an important factor; and allowing for a relationship to grow naturally so it can build a strong foundation is crucial. I learned through these responses that most people have a general and similar understanding of mentorship relationships and how to build them. But what I also learned was that a mentor relationship will never survive if there is no passion or motivation behind it. Reading these responses made me question why some people think “pre-existing relationships” is necessary for a healthy mentor relationship. I think the community should work more to help people build and develop mentorship relationships.

Q: What kind of relationship skills do you need to become a mentor?

The most common and important qualities are a willingness to communicate truthfully and being genuine. Not the speaking but the restraint and listening are the important aspects of communication. “When one is silent they hear more”. Other important qualities are patience and an ability to teach. One response shared “be kind, be understanding, be a listener, be sympathetic and be ready to learn.” The responses were quite similar and purposeful and one that I had not considered was to be funny (“laughter can go a long way in certain situations”) which I found to be true as comedy is often the best way to lighten up a mood and to make people open up.

The responses to this question were great with answers like being understanding and non-judgemental also lead back into the listening part of communication. They include feedback given whether it be verbal or physical. What these responses put into perspective for me was how many skills are needed to become a successful mentor and how many of these are practical. Questions that keep me curious about this include how one becomes good at these skills and how can an individual without these skills obtain them or even be a good mentor without them?

Q: What impact do mentors have on the community?

They form good relationships with the community, which allow that community to grow in all aspects of engagement, relationship/trust building etc. What I learned from the responses is how people see mentors in their communities and really how important having mentors are in the sense that everyone’s responses underlined that mentors positively impact collective growth by going the extra mile to ensure success for the individual that they are mentoring . One response that stood out to me was “

"A mentor can cause a community to react differently to the environment that they are “stuck in”. They see it’s potential and build it, and before you know it those philosophical words they say becomes an idea for the community to act upon.”

These responses sparked new questions for me such as “How important are mentors in regards to community growth?” I think the community can look at these responses and see how their own mentors from their communities have assisted in the development of the community.

Q: What are the important resources a mentor needs?

Mentors are responsible for the way the mentoring arrangement works by setting boundaries, setting expectations, setting the time, and the way in which it’s going to work. People respond that mentors need support, both from other mentors and from the community. Some important resources can be training in relationship building, with webinars and other formats.

Becoming familiar with resource centres like the Pride Centre or Africa Centre will help. The resource centres will offer services to newcomers such as business courses that offer a brighter future which is an important support for people that have just moved to Canada and do not have the support that they would have back home. Most people also said qualities such as having great communication skills, a kind heart, non judgmental manner, safe spaces that ensure privacy and comfort are important.

”A mentor’s best resource is experience. Experience helps a mentor teach others as they've already been through the same struggles.”

“Mentors need to know themselves, know their own capacity and boundaries, mentors need to love themselves and know each person comes from love.”

COMMUNITY RESOURCES

Mennonite Centre for Newcomers
Alberta Mentoring Partnership
Catholic Social Services

Helen Rusich
Program Director
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Ali Mahdi
Program Director
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Chelsea Burke
Program Director
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Jaime Calayo
Community Engagement
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