January is National Mentoring Month:
Successful, Long-term Mentoring Helps the Entire Community

Longstanding studies show long-term, one-to-one, volunteer mentoring works. As we mark National Mentoring Month this January, Big Brothers Big Sisters of Gallatin County is honoring all who make up our successful community —parents, volunteers, schools, staff and donors who work together to make a mentoring match strong, enduring and successful.

Behind every successful mentoring match is a team of selfless, dedicated believers. There’s the volunteer who makes time in his schedule to commit to letting a child know how special he is. There’s also the parent or guardian, who may be a single mom or grandmother, who courageously seeks support to give her child every opportunity to succeed. Then there’s the staff person, a professional who uses facts from interviews, references, experience and intuition to match the right child and family with the right volunteer. And behind every relationship are the donors, whose financial resources make it possible for our mentors, mentees and parents to get the ongoing support, guidance and resources that help them establish and maintain the kind of dialogue, communication and understanding that are behind BBBS successful and long-term one-to-one mentoring relationships.

One of our own matches Sam (BB) and Rowan (LB) who have been matched for a year shared their story. They love to ride bikes together. They started playing folf (disc golf) together and really enjoy that. They celebrated their one year anniversary last Friday and when Sam picked Rowan up from school they went to Buffalo Wild Wings for dinner and trivia…which they won!! Then they went to a movie. After that they had a snowball fight (they’ve had a couple of these now). Rowan said that Sam went to all of his soccer games this fall! What an awesome Big Brother, says LB. Whenever staff talks to Sam for their update, it is like he is just as excited to share what they are doing together. Sam feels like he is getting more out of the match than Rowan is. Mom said “the match is perfect. They are two peas in a pod together.” They just play so well together. Rowan is always super excited when they get together, but he was really excited about their one year anniversary. Sam was just as excited.

The nation’s leader in quality one-to-one youth mentoring services, Big Brothers Big Sisters holds itself accountable for and is able to measure specific youth outcomes — educational achievement, avoidance of risky behaviors, higher self-esteem, confidence and ability to relate to others. At BBBSGC, we know that longer matches yield strong results for our Littles.

National Mentoring Month is spearheaded by the Harvard Mentoring Project of the Harvard School of Public Health, MENTOR/National Mentoring Partnership, and the Corporation for National and Community Service with the understanding that mentoring “assures brighter futures for our young people.” The goal of Big Brothers Big Sisters is to become the extra support that so many parents seek — to help their children succeed and break negative cycles. It is a worthwhile investment that has dividends for the entire community.

Mentoring Month is a time when many parents get their children signed up and lots of volunteers come forward to help. We expect that to be especially be true this coming year with economic circumstances creating a greater need for more families to have professionally backed long-term mentoring support. Big Brothers Big Sisters of Gallatin County has been successfully serving children throughout our county and the surrounding areas for over 38 years. The demand is so great that we currently have 45 Littles waiting to be matched with Bigs.

To all Bigs, families, corporate and educational partners, and individual donors who are a part of our network, thank you for working together to help Gallatin county’s children.

Please join Big Brothers Big Sisters in a nationwide movement this January by contacting your local agency in Gallatin County at: 15 South 8th Ave, Bozeman, 587-1216 or www.bbbs-gc.org   and see how you can Start Something BIG in your community today.