What's New @ iMentor

Today in his State of the City address, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg announced that iMentor is partnering with 10 leading New York-based companies that will each recruit 100 of their employees to serve as mentors for high school students in low-income communities. These additional volunteers will allow iMentor to expand its program in New York City to help 1,000 additional students succeed in high school, college, and careers.

iMentor, a leading youth mentoring organization in New York City, launched the 100 Mentor Pledge in partnership with 10 companies that are committed to serving New York City’s youth: Accenture, Barclays Capital, Bloomberg LP, Citi, Deutsche Bank, Ernst & Young LLP, Goldman Sachs, Marsh & McLennan Companies, Morgan Stanley, and UBS. iMentor will match the companies’ employees with students from its partner schools in one-on-one mentoring relationships that will last up to four years. Mentors will help students develop key competencies linked to college success, navigate the college application and financial aid processes, and build career awareness. The commitment of these companies will allow iMentor expand its programs to meet its goal of serving 3,000 students in New York City by 2013.

In his remarks, Mayor Bloomberg cited college and career-readiness as one of five priorities for improving the City’s schools. Mayor Bloomberg highlighted iMentor’s 100 Mentor Pledge as a key initiative to help achieve this goal. “In recent weeks, many of our city’s leading corporate citizens have joined a mentoring program for high school students callediMentor,” said Mayor Bloomberg. He called for more New York City companies to join the pledge and help students become college and career-ready: “to the leaders of our hospitals, hotels, nonprofits and small businesses of every kind, including our growing tech community: join us in this new effort to connect high school students to career paths. One of the companies that has already agreed to participate, I’m proud to say, is Bloomberg LP.”

“iMentor is grateful to the 10 visionary companies that helped launch the 100 Mentor Pledge, which will provide vital support to our schools and students,” said iMentor CEO Mike O’Brien. “We are thankful for Mayor Bloomberg’s support and I join him in encouraging more to follow their example and join the pledge.”

Improved college-readiness for students in public schools is vital to supporting young people as they enter the 21^st-century workforce. It is estimated that by 2018, 63 percent of all domestic jobs will require at least some college education. Yet, in New York State, only 37 percent of all students graduated high school college-ready last year, including only 13 percent of African American and 15 percent of Latino students. Nationally, almost half of low-income students who do enroll in college do not re-enroll in the second year. With a national average student-to-college counselor ratio of 500:1, schools need mentors to help provide the individualized support low-income students need.

iMentor has matched more than 7,000 youth in New York City with mentors since 1999 and the results have been impressive. Independent evaluations of iMentor have shown that participation in the program has a statistically significant impact on student attendance levels, grades, and standardized test scores. In 2011, 83 percent of iMentor’s students graduated from high school and 67 percent of mentees enrolled in college.

To get your organization involved with the pledge, contact Julia Love. Or, sign up today to become a mentor.

The Lumina Foundation for Education announced today that iMentor is one of six recipients of its "Next Generation of Student Supports" prize. On Wednesday, James L. Applegate, vice president for program development at Lumina, will discuss the "NextGen" prize and iMentor in his keynote address at the Consumer Electronics Show’s HigherEdTECH conference in Las Vegas.

Research shows that prospective college students and their families have difficulty finding information about college, particularly the availability of financial aid and grants. To address this challenge, Lumina has awarded more than $1.1 million in planning grants aimed at helping develop the “next generation” of college-access supports and services. These “NextGen” grants are designed to leverage the power of digital technology to promote new and innovative ways to support students on their pathway to college.

Lumina has awarded iMentor $200,000 to support research and development for its student mentoring platform. iMentor's proprietary online platform connects thousands of adult volunteers with young people in multi-year mentoring relationships focused on college-readiness. The platform allows iMentor to screen mentors, match mentor-mentee pairs based on common interests, facilitate guided online communication, and track program effectiveness. Mentors and mentees use a combination of weekly emails and monthly in-person meetings to develop their one-on-one relationships and work through iMentor's rigorous college-readiness curriculum. iMentor also provides its technology tools, curriculum, and consulting services to nonprofits across the country so they can implement their own mentoring programs in the iMentor model. Funds from Lumina will allow iMentor to develop new applications to improve mentor and mentee interaction with the platform, increase the quality of their relationships, and expand data capacity to enhance program analytics.

Other recipients of the prize are College Forward, Educational Policy Improvement Center, EduGuide, San Francisco Education Fund, and Southern Region Education Board.

The “NextGen” project is part of Lumina’s broader commitment to expanding access and success in education beyond high school, particularly among adults, first-generation college students, low-income students and students of color. This mission is directed toward a single overarching “Big Goal”—to increase the proportion of Americans with high-quality degrees and credentials to 60 percent by the year 2025.

This month all over the country, mentoring is being celebrated and recognized for its power to help young people achieve their goals and dreams. During National Mentoring Month, organizations and individuals across the country will raise awareness of mentoring and encourage more people to volunteer as mentors in their communities.

Through our own work, we have seen firsthand how transformative mentors can be in the lives of high school students from low-income communities. This year, we have 2,400 mentors in New York City helping students graduate high school college-ready and succeed in college. Our dedicated volunteers know that success doesn’t happen overnight, and they work one-on-one with students over the course of several years to them build the leadership, social, and critical-thinking skills they need to achieve their goals. They email their mentees once a week to help them identify the right college, come up with a college essay topic, and figure out how to fit in at a new school. They meet them in person once a month to fill out their financial aid forms, work on study skills, and practice interviewing. Together, mentors and mentees celebrate successes and solve problems. And they build relationships that last a lifetime.

iMentor is pleased to be joining in the celebration of National Mentoring Month through special announcements, events, and opportunities for online engagement. Throughout January, we’ll be sharing news and updates about our work as well as providing ways for you to become involved. 

We hope you’ll join us in celebration of National Mentoring Month. Get started by becoming a mentor today or recruiting someone you know to mentor. Sign up here. 

This holiday season, we are excited that there is a new way to give the gift of mentoring to more students in 2012--iMentor has the honor of being included in Morgan Stanley Smith Barney’s Gifts for Good catalog.

Donations we receive this holiday season will help us provide 2,400 students from low-income communities with college-educated mentors who will help them graduate high school college ready and succeed in college. Gifts from our supporters are vital to our work and help us host events for our students to work one-on-one with their mentors and provide technology resources that help our pairs work through the iMentor curriculum.

iMentor is proud to be among the 20 organizations chosen for inclusion in the catalog and to be recognized for our accomplishments this year. Douglas Ketterer, managing director and head of US Morgan Stanley private wealth management, said that the organizations featured in the catalog “have differentiated themselves from other nonprofits and have become best-in-class leaders in their charitable areas.”

With the support of our mentors and donors, in 2011 iMentor has achieved great things:

• 83% of mentees graduated from high school 
• 87% of mentees feel positive about their future after participating in iMentor 
• Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation awarded iMentor a $500,000 grant
• We launched national partnerships with top national organizations, including Admission Possible, City Year, KIPP through College, and Single Stop at Miami Dade Community College
• We won Google's inaugural Best New York City Non-Profit Award

We have big plans for 2012, and look forward to expanding the iMentor community to include more students, schools, nonprofits, and supporters who are committed to mentoring. You can join us by giving a holiday gift of mentoring.