Youth Mentoring Update

Youth Mentoring is excited to announce that they are one of 11 recipients in the state of Iowa to receive an Improving Tomorrow: Prevention focused Mentoring grant from the Iowa Department of Public Health. The grant has four exciting goals! They are: 

• Support 91 mentoring matches in our four counties. 
• Substance abuse prevention and problem gambling training’s will be offered as well as distributing materials on these topics. 
• Our Steering Committees will support the behind the scenes work.
• A sustainability plan will help us financially.

This funding source will support some salaries, events, training’s, mileage, recruitment materials, phone, and computer needs.  

In June, some mentors and mentees began meeting in-person with precautions in place including face coverings, social distancing, and recommendations to meet outside when possible. Others are keeping in contact by chatting via phone or Zoom and writing letters. Youth Mentoring is supportive of how each individual match chooses to meet. 

During this unusual time, recruitment efforts for new mentors have continued. Five new matches began in the past few weeks! There is still a need for mentors as youth need more ways to be supported. Production of the “things to do videos” that Youth Mentoring staff have created and have been sharing on our Facebook page ended in June as we focus on in person events. You can watch all of the videos on our YouTube page.