Providing summertime contact in school-based mentoring programs

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Abstract

One of the main challenges for school-based mentoring programs is keeping matches in touch over the summer break when extensive in-person meetings may not be possible. Research indicates that school-based mentoring relationships suffer when summer contact is absent. Luckily, there are several strategies available to school-based mentoring programs to keep matches engaged, minimize the negative impact of the summer break on relationship quality, and get matches ready to build on positive momentum when the school year starts back up. This effective practice was submitted by LEARNS at the Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory in April 2008.

Issue

Educators have long known about a phenomenon called "summer learning loss," the tendency for students of all ages to experience some regression in academic performance and retained knowledge due to the long period of time spent away from the classroom over the summer break. One study found that this loss equaled at least one month of instruction as measured by grade-appropriate standardized test scores (Cooper, Nye, Charlton, Lindsay, and Greathouse, 1996). Other research indicates that lower achieving students, those frequently targeted by school-based mentoring programs, are more susceptible to this regression than higher achieving students (Allinder and Fuchs, 1991). Many educators also note that the summer break tends to disrupt students' social interactions, daily schedules, and peer relationships and removes opportunities to form connections with positive adults and the school setting itself.

Given that school-based mentors do their work within the context of the school environment, it should come as no surprise that recent research has identified a similar type of "loss" for mentoring relationships over the summer months, when many school-based programs provide only limited activities or eliminate mentoring sessions altogether.

Mentoring relationships require longevity and consistency to achieve optimal results. The summer break presents a challenge for both of these criteria, leaving programs scrambling to find meaningful opportunities for matches to interact while often having limited staffing and access to facilities over the break. Researcher Jean Rhodes (2002) has noted that suspending services during the summer months "is short-sighted, particularly since program effects tend to accrue with time, and many behavioral problems and difficulties arise during the summer months." If school-based mentoring programs are to be effective, they must find a way of keeping the momentum from the school year going over the break.

Action

Although each school-based mentoring program has unique structures, staffing, resources, and facilities, there are several options for just about any program that wants to keep matches in contact over the summer months. To design appropriate summer contact activities, program coordinators should:

Take stock of the access they have to resources like meeting space, temporary staff, other school services (summer school, athletic facilities, etc.), community-based learning opportunities, and transportation.
Base decisions on the level of supervision the program can provide and the appropriateness of the summer activities. Activities should only take place if the program can ensure the safety of participants and if the activities match the goals of the program.

If conducting regular weekly meetings at the school site is not possible, the following strategies can still provide opportunities for matches to meet up:

Many schools have club and athletic activities during the summer (football, band, orchestra, etc.). Mentors may be able to visit (or even assist) during these times.
Boys & Girls Clubs and YMCAs have a variety of activities for youth during the summer months. Ask representatives of these organizations about using their facilities for mentoring time. They may be able to provide supervision, a safe environment, access to other group outings, or help with transportation.
Take a group field trip to local college campuses, art museums, nature areas, sporting events, or other community-enrichment places.
Schedule a group basketball or softball game among mentors and mentees (this can be a great parent-involvement piece as well, especially if combined with a picnic).
Arrange for matches to participate in service-learning activities (group or individual). See the Learn and Serve America website for more information on service-learning (www.learnandserve.org).
Have matches help out with fundraising activities for the program (car washes, bake sales, walk-a-thons, etc.). Be sure to follow any fundraising guidelines your program may be subject to.
As summer winds down, gather mentors, parents and guardians, and mentees in preparation for the start of the school year. Hold "get reacquainted" events to prepare everyone for the school year ahead.

If in-person events of any type are not an option for your program, there are still several strategies for keeping matches in contact over the summer. Some programs allow matches to call each other over the summer months. But for many school-based programs, telephone contact is prohibited, and even if allowed over the summer, there are concerns that this type of contact could create a number of problems. Program coordinators should discuss the benefits and risks of phone contact with the program's advisory committee, legal counsel, and other stakeholders before making a decision.

In lieu of phone contact, many school-based mentoring programs offer some form of written correspondence over the summer months. There are several free or low-cost options for conducting a summer correspondence campaign:

Postcards — Print and prepay postage on custom postcards that mentors and mentees can use throughout the summer months. Postcards are especially helpful for sending quick notes and updates while on vacation and are a great way for matches to share their summer adventures.
Pros: Low cost; limited amount of writing for youth; limited opportunities for boundary issues to arise or unauthorized meetings to occur.
Cons: Difficult for staff to monitor frequency or content of correspondence.

Traditional letters — A more robust form of correspondence involves matches taking the time to write letters to each other throughout the summer. Your program can provide stationary, envelopes, stamps, pens and pencils, and even ideas for writing topics (see sample topics below).
Pros: Low cost; limited opportunities for boundary issues to arise or unauthorized meetings to occur.
Cons: Youth may be intimidated by lengthier writing "assignments;" prescribed topics may feel like "homework" to youth; difficult for staff to monitor frequency or content of correspondence.

E-mail — Some programs are adopting an e-mentoring component over the summer months. For little or no cost, your program can set up e-mail accounts for your mentors and mentees (Gmail and Yahoo! Mail are popular choices), providing them with a unique username and password. This allows matches to have frequent, even daily, contact over the summer months. It also enables your staff, if they choose, to monitor the content of messages (make sure participants know that you may be checking in on their e-mails from time to time).
Pros: Low cost; easy for program staff to monitor correspondence for red flags; program can use e-mail accounts to notify participants about in-person group activities over the summer; accounts can also be used to supplement the relationship during the school year if both parties desire.
Cons: Participants (especially mentees) may not have home Internet access or much privacy when using a home computer; potential use of staff time to monitor correspondence.

Regardless of which approach you take to a summer correspondence campaign, the following tips can help make it successful:

Have ground rules in place— Make sure mentors, mentees, and parents of participating youth know the expectations and limitations of the summer correspondence campaign. You may want to create rules around frequency of contact, both in terms of a minimum amount (remember, bi-weekly contact seemed to be a threshold for success in the P/PV study) and limitations on frequency ("Don't send your mentor 25 emails a day."). Reiterate policies that prohibit unauthorized off-site contact, and remind matches that all program guidelines about privacy, confidentiality, and mandatory reporting of potentially harmful situations apply equally to their written communications as they do face-to-face interactions throughout the school year.

Mentors and mentees should have compatible expectations about the nature of their summer correspondence. They should understand that the campaign is designed to supplement their in-school mentoring relationship, not replace it in terms of intensity or frequency. Encourage matches to talk about how open they are to sharing their feelings in writing and how quickly and in what level of detail they typically respond to e-mail messages. The last thing you want is for youth to feel slighted because their mentor took a few days to respond to an e-mail message or for mentors to be disappointed that their five-page letter only got a two-paragraph response from a student who is uncomfortable doing a lot of writing. Matches that are on the same page before writing each other are far less likely to be disappointed by the experience.

Make participation easy — Most programs gather all the supplies, instructions, and ground rules for their summer correspondence campaign into a summer packet that matches receive and go over during one of their last in-person meetings just before the break. These packets keep stationary and other materials organized and make it easy for participants to correspond while on vacations or other out-of-town excursions.

If you are doing a traditional letter writing campaign, make sure participants have supplied correct address information. If using e-mail, keep in mind that some mentees do not have home e-mail access. Provide instructions on how they can access their account from computers at the public library, and designate a staff person who can help troubleshoot technical problems.

In addition to providing supplies, you may want to provide guidance about what matches should "discuss" over the summer. Some programs provide general conversation starters while others provide a weekly writing assignment that matches are required to complete. Choose a set of activities and writing topics that feels like a good fit for your participants and program goals.

Monitor matches over the break — Even though matches will not be meeting in person, it is still important to check in with mentors, mentees, and parents to see if any issues have come up and to ensure that the match is writing to each other frequently. This can be done over the phone or by e-mail. If you are using e-mail for summer communications, program staff can access those accounts and look at messages, especially if there seem to be problems. Be sure to look out for:

Mentors or mentees neglecting to write frequently
Attempts by either party to engage in disallowed in-person meetings
Major changes in mentors' or mentees' lives that could impact their meeting again in the fall (such as moving or transferring schools)

Evaluate the effectiveness of your summer activities — Keep track of how often matches communicate and gather feedback on the correspondence campaign and any in-person group activities over the summer. A short survey just before school begins can gauge participants' feelings about the frequency, content, and usefulness of their summer contact. This information can help you improve the campaign the following year and might let you know which matches will need some extra support as the new school year begins.

Context

The need for consistent summer contact for school-based mentoring relationships is examined in Public/Private Venture's (P/PV) study of 10 school-based mentoring programs, as documented in Making a Difference in Schools: The Big Brothers Big Sisters School-based Mentoring Impact Study. The study found that programs that encouraged or provided opportunities for some contact between mentors and mentees over the summer months had much better outcomes in terms of continued relationship length and quality (Herrera, Grossman, Kauh, Feldman, and McMaken, 2007).

The 10 Big Brothers Big Sisters (BBBS) agencies in the P/PV study represented a diverse group of school-based mentoring programs, although they all shared some characteristics that led to their selection. Each agency had been doing school-based mentoring for over four years, served at least 150 youth annually, and used mentors from multiple sources, such as local business and high schools. Each also had formal agreements with the school sites for the delivery of services. The study itself covered 71 participating schools (the vast majority being elementary and middle schools) and a total of 1,139 youth. Half of these youth were randomly selected to receive mentoring while the other half formed a control group. The youth participants had a mix of risk factors: over two-thirds were on free or reduced lunch, 39 percent were living in single parent homes, and most were facing a number of academic and social issues prior to participating in the study. Overall, three-quarters of the participating youth were having difficulties in one of the four risk areas identified (academic performance, school behavior, youth-reported misconduct, and personal relationships).

Outcome

In the Spring of 2007, a Big Brothers Big Sisters (BBBS) advisory group adopted a number of changes to be implemented in BBBS school-based mentoring programs nationwide. These changes included requiring a full one-year commitment for school-based matches, removing the mentoring relationship from the school year cycle. The group also recommended summer programming and group activities designed to keep matches in contact over breaks. An emphasis was also placed on strengthening school partnerships so that the mentoring services were more fully integrated into the culture, schedule, and facilities of the school site. These changes position school-based mentoring as a year-long support service for students. (Big Brothers Big Sisters, 2007)

Evidence

Programs in P/PV's study that encouraged or provided opportunities for some contact between mentors and mentees over the summer months had much better outcomes in terms of continued relationship length and quality. The researchers noted, "Matches that communicated at least monthly during the summer were over one-third more likely to carry over into the following school year and lasted significantly longer after the end of summer than those that did not communicate."

Matches that had engaged in at least bi-weekly contact over the summer showed statistically significant improvement in the quality of their mentoring relationships compared to matches that had little or no contact. One program in the study provided weekly in-person mentoring meetings over the summer months for roughly half of their students. These matches were associated with a number of improved outcomes, including better overall academic performance and feeling more confident about schoolwork. The researchers conclude that "when the mentoring relationship continues without major interruption, positive impacts seen after the first school year may be sustained."

Posted On

April 15, 2008

For More Information

Michael Garringer

National Mentoring Center at Education Northwest

101 SW Main Street, Suite 500

Portland, OR 97204

Phone: (503) 275-9647

Email: Michael.Garringer@educationnorthwest.org

Resources

Allinder, R.M., and Fuchs, L.S. (1991). The effects of summer break on math skills of learning disabled and low-achieving students. BC Journal of Special Education, 15(3), 269-275.

Big Brothers Big Sisters. (2007). Big Brothers Big Sisters: School-based mentoring toolkit-from good to great. Philadelphia, PA: Author.

Cooper, H., Nye, B., Charlton, K., Lindsay, J., and Greathouse, S. (1996). The effects of summer vacation on achievement test scores: A narrative and meta-analytic review. Review of Educational Research, 66(3), 227-268.

Herrera, C., Grossman, J.B., Kauh, T.J., Feldman, A.F., & McMaken, J. (with Jucovy, L.Z.). (2007). Making a difference in schools: The Big Brothers Big Sisters school-based mentoring impact study. Philadelphia, PA: Public/Private Ventures.

Mentoring Resource Center. (2008). Keeping matches in touch over the summer months [Fact Sheet #20]. Folsom, CA: Author.

Mentoring Resource Center. (2007). The BBBS school-based mentoring impact study: Findings and implications for policy and practice. Folsom, CA: Author.

Mentoring Resource Center. (2005). Keeping mentoring relationships going through the summer months [Fact Sheet #2]. Folsom, CA: Author.

Rhodes, J.E. (2002). Stand by me: The risks and rewards of mentoring today's youth. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.