Standing Tall school-based mentoring program - Australian Youth ...

Standing Tall
School Based Mentor i n g Prog r a m
A school and a community working together to support young people to fulfil their potential
‘ i t t a k e s a c o m m u n i t y t o r a i s e a c h i l d ’
Report for Handbury Fellowship
2008
Jeanette Pritchard

Introduction
Standing Tall is a school-based mentoring
program which has been implemented at both
Baimbridge and Camperdown Secondary
Colleges in the Barwon South West Region
of the Department of Education and Early
Childhood Development of Victoria.
Standing Tall
In 2008 a Handbury Fellowship, granted
by RMIT University, allowed me be look at
mentoring in the context of the current research
on the well-being of young people in Australia,
the link between well-being and educational
outcomes and the current thinking regarding
Jeanette Pritchard
well-being in the Victorian Department of
Education and Early Childhood Development. It also allowed me to look at the
research on mentoring in more depth.
As a secondary school teacher I was becoming increasingly aware that many
young people are not taking full advantage of what we offer in schools. As the
Professional Development Coordinator at Baimbridge College I was well aware
that educators have traditionally seen the content of the curriculum and the
competent delivery of that curriculum, by teachers, as being the most effective way
to address the issue of disengagement.
In recent years I have come to realise there are many other factors at work and I am
now aware that meeting the social and emotional needs of young people, through the
creation of supportive environments, is an important foundation for young people to
take advantage of their education. There are many students in our schools who could
benefit from extra support and the community stands as an untapped resource.
Developing and implementing the Standing Tall school-based mentoring program
has shown me that there are many people in the community who are willing to
become involved in supporting young people if given the opportunity. Developing
and implementing the program has been one of the most satisfying endeavours of
my career.
It is my hope that this report is able to capture how school-based mentoring can
make a contribution and why it is worthy of support from government, community
and schools themselves. Supporting young people is one of the wisest investments a
society can make.
This report has been finished at the time of the inauguration of Barack Obama,
a time of optimism because of a belief that society can address its problems if
its members are willing to work together in a spirit of co-operation and shared
responsibility. Barack Obama strongly supports mentoring and in a one page
advertisement in Newsweek he urged community members to ‘Be part of the
change : mentor a child.’

Standing Tall
Acknowledgements
This report has been possible because of a RMIT Handbury Fellowship and I am
very grateful for the opportunity that has been afforded me.
I would like pay tribute to the inspiration of Susan Weinberger, founder and
President of the Mentor Consulting Group Norwalk, Connecticut. As a pioneer in
the field of school-based mentoring, her advice, support and encouragement have
been invaluable. She has indeed been my mentor.
I would also like to thank Jean Rhodes, Professor of Psychology at the University
of Massachusetts, Boston and Carla Herrera, Senior Policy Researcher with
Public/Private Ventures Philadelphia, for their support.
I pay tribute to the support of the personnel at the RMIT Hamilton campus
particularly Kaye Schofield and Paul Collits.
I acknowledge the guidance of my wise and patient supervisor Robyn Hartley who
has been very supportive of both the idea and the implementation of the program
and has guided its evaluation.
I thank Melissa Collits for her support in the evaluating of the program and her
careful editing of the report.
I would like to thank all the mentors for their involvement in the Standing Tall
program. Their enthusiasm and commitment has been an inspiration and has made
all the endeavours of the program worthwhile.
I acknowledge the support and encouragement of the Committee of Management
of Standing Tall. They come from a wide range of community organisations and
they have been very supportive in supporting both the idea and the implementation
of the Standing Tall Project.
I acknowledge the interest of the Office of Youth the Department of Community
Planning of the Victorian Government in particular Faye Whitehead and Gina
Fiske.
It has been a privilege to work with the staff at Baimbridge College and the
support and encouragement of the Principal Rob Vecchiet and the Welfare
Coordinator Val McDowell have been invaluable.
Lastly I would like to thank the community of Hamilton for the way that they
have taken the concept of mentoring into their hearts and have, in so many ways,
supported efforts made by the program to support young people.
Jeanette Pritchard

Table of contents
Standing Tall
Report Summary 5
Chapter 1: The Social Context for Young People 13
Chapter 2: Schools 20
Chapter 3: Mentoring 37
Chapter 4: School-based Mentoring 49
Chapter 5: Standing Tall School-based mentoring program 56
Chapter 6: Evaluation of the Standing Tall program 67
Chapter 7: Conclusions 86
References and Appendix 91

Standing Tall
Report summary
Literature review
Findings
In preparing this report a literature review was conducted in regard to:
• contemporary research on the well-being of young people in Australia
• disengagement of students in Australian schools
• protective and risk factors for young people
• current well-being policies and priorities in the Victorian Department of
Education
• research on mentoring and specifically school-based mentoring.
Schools are the greatest investment that Australian society places in young people
and the concomitant expectation is teachers will prepare young people to move into
society with the skills and knowledge necessary for them to function as competent
and responsible members of the community.
The quality of this preparation determines how much young people are able to
fulfil their potential and its success has vital implications for society, as a whole as
well as the individual young person. As is stated in the Doing it Differently Report:
Improving Young People’s Engagement with Schools (Butler et al 2006):
Genuine engagement with learning and with others within the school
environment is a key to positive outcomes across a range of immediate
and long term health, academic and life outcomes. 1
In Victoria, the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development
(DEECD) focuses both on delivering the best possible educational outcomes and
providing effective pathways and transitions for young people.
Young people in schools have, as a backdrop, a number of social pressures and
research on the well-being of young people in Australia indicates that a number
of them are struggling with a range of issues which impact on their mental health
thus impeding their ability to fulfil their potential. In the education sector,
disengagement, as reflected in retention rates, is a concern. The It’s Crunch Time-
Raising Youth Engagement and Attainment report (2007) by the Dusseldorp Skills

Mentoring
Standing Tall
Forum and the Australian Industry Group looked at how young people are faring
in the education system and concluded that retention rates have not improved
in Australia in the last 15 years. The report highlights the fact that a significant
number of young people aged between 15 and 24 are neither in full-time learning
nor full-time work. 2 The report How are Young People Faring 2007: At a Glance,
also by the Dussledorp Skills Forum, quotes Professor Barry McGraw the former
Director for Education of the OECD as saying:
While other OECD countries have managed to progressively and
incrementally improve school completion rates, the rates in Australia
have barely shifted in the last 15 years. Many of these young people are
disengaging from school early in the years of their secondary education. 3
Awareness of the strong link between the social-emotional health of young people
and educational outcomes has led to a focus on the well-being and engagement of
students. In Victoria, DEECD has looked closely at practices and policies which
create supportive environments for young people and has sought to identify the risk
and protective factors in those environments. One of the most important protective
factors highlighted in the literature is the creation of supportive relationships,
particularly one-to-one relationships with caring adults. A major DEECD policy
document, The Framework for Student Support Services in Victorian Government
Schools (1998), makes a recommendation that there be:
The establishment of strategies to develop a student’s sense of belonging
to a school community and their ability to deal with life circumstances
including the establishment of a ‘one-to-one relationship with a caring
adult. 4
The ‘caring adult’ in schools is usually seen as a teacher and two projects initiated
by DEECD, the Advocacy Program (1997) and the Connecting in the Middle Years
(2001) program, have sought to provide support for the setting up of one-to-one
relationships between students and teachers.
However, the growing pressure on teachers to deliver educational outcomes and
complex assessment raises the possibility that teachers, even though they work
hard to create supportive environments, may be unable to establish one-to-one
relationships with the number of young people who could benefit from such
relationships.
The establishment of youth mentoring programs which recruit and train members
of the community to develop supportive relationships with young people can be
seen as a proactive way to address that need for a number of young people. Jean
Rhodes, renowned researcher in the field of mentoring, has found that the concept
of mentoring fits in with a number of psychological theories which propose that a
one-to-one relationship between a young person and a caring adult can enhance
the cognitive, social-emotional development and identity formation of the young
person if an emotional bond is formed.
The most traditional form of youth mentoring is community-based mentoring
and the research shows that, if programs are based on best practice, there can be
positive outcomes for young people.

Standing Tall
However, the fact that the fastest growth in mentoring in the United States in
the last decade has been school-based mentoring, has led to a number of research
studies to ascertain if the different conditions of school-based mentoring can also
produce positive outcomes. The literature shows that this can happen but once
again finds programs must be based on best practice.
Standing Tall school-based mentoring program
The Standing Tall school-based mentoring program has been implemented at
Baimbridge College in Hamilton, a rural city of 10,000 in Western Victoria.
The College is a P-12 State school and its feeder schools are the State schools
which service the city and the surrounding district. The College provides a wide
curriculum and a range of extra-curricular opportunities and works on the premise
that students have a belief in the value of their education and have a sense of
connection to the College. However it has been the experience of the College
that there are students who display attitudes and behaviour which results in them
not taking advantage of what the College offers. Reasons identified by school
personnel include the social pressures students face, such as family circumstances
and peer pressure, and personal factors such as lack of confidence and motivation.
The welfare structure at the College is strong and teachers work hard to provide
a supportive environment for the students. However, pressures on teachers at the
College can limit the time that they have to support individual students.
The Standing Tall school-based mentoring program was established at the College
in 2003 in response to a belief by personnel at the College that there were a
number of students who could benefit from supportive one-on-one relationships
with members of the community. The key elements underlying the Standing Tall
program, many of which are based on best practice identified in the research
literature, are:
• recruiting suitable mentors
Community members who become mentors need to be non-judgmental,
have good communication skills, be respectful of young people and willing
to make a commitment. They also need to have maturity because mentoring
relationships can be complex.
• appropriate preparation and support of mentors
Preparation and training of mentors is vital as mentors must have a clear
understanding of their role and the knowledge and skills to carry it out. Once
mentors are in the program they must be supported.
• needs of the young person
Each student who enters the program is different so there needs to be
flexibility in the mentoring practice as mentors focus on getting to know the
students and building up trust through a wide range of activities and projects
based on the individual needs of the students. Once this is established
mentors can assist young people to identify their goals and support them in
achieving them.

• early intervention
Standing Tall
Students at risk of disengaging often show attitudes and behaviours early
in their school career. There is value in establishing mentoring relationships
before such behaviours and attitudes become entrenched.
• length of relationship
Research shows that mentoring relationships need to have length to be
effective. Mentors are asked to make a commitment for at least 12 months.
• working closely with the school
1) a school needs to be informed about the role of mentoring so there is
a sense of ownership by the school and teachers can make appropriate
referrals.
2) the program needs to work closely with the welfare structure at a school,
respecting that mentoring is not a panacea and there are young people
whose problems need professional support beyond what mentoring can
offer.
• clear message regarding mentoring
Mentoring is a concept which can easily be misunderstood and it is important
that the school and community be well informed that mentoring is about
empowering young people to realise their potential through identifying their
assets rather than rescuing, ‘fixing up’ or changing a young person. It is not a
replacement for other vital roles that teachers, counsellors and parents fulfil.
The program has been strongly supported by the school and the community has
responded positively.
The program has set up relationships with students from Grade 3 to Year 11 at the
College and its feeder schools and has been replicated at Camperdown College.
Evaluation of Standing Tall program
The evaluation of the Standing Tall school-based mentoring program explored the
effectiveness of the program by assessing:
• the ability of the program to establish close relationships between members of
the community and students within a school setting
• the identification of any positive personal or school related outcomes
for young people as observed by the young people themselves and the
observations of the mentors and the teachers
• the contribution of the key elements of the program
• the need to modify or improve any aspects of the program
• benefits to the school, the mentors and the wider community.
A total of 41 relationships were being supported in the program at the time of the
evaluation however the evaluation focused on the relationships between mentors
and students which were over 6 months in duration. All relationships assessed were

Standing Tall 10
Findings
with boys perceived as not taking full advantage of the educational opportunities
offered. They ranged from Grade 4 to Year 11 students.
Surveys were given to students, mentors and teachers. Focus groups were
conducted with the mentors and interviews were undertaken with school personnel
and students. Feedback was sought from the College Principal and members of the
community and other schools in the Barwon South West Region of Education.
• The evaluation showed the mentors in the program have been effective in creating
strong relationships with all students reporting that they felt they were liked,
listened to and accepted as they were by their mentors. Most of the mentors
stated that they believed that trust had built up in the relationships. In the focus
groups the mentors spoke about the wide range of activities, projects and support
for school work they had undertaken in response to the individual needs of
students.
• Personal and school related outcomes were identified by students, mentors and
teachers. After six months a large percentage of students stated they were more
confident and this was supported by the observations of most mentors. The
majority of the students stated that their relationships with their peers and family
had improved.
• Most of the mentors stated that they believed their student’s attitudes to school
had improved with almost three-quarters of the students agreeing. This could
be because mentors often help their students recognise the relevance of their
education to their future aspirations. A majority of students stated that they
believed that the school cared about them, an important factor in a student
feeling connected to school.
• After 10 months of mentoring both teachers and mentors noted shifts to more
positive attitudes and behaviours with teachers observing a shift to greater
cooperation and increased motivation and mentors observing that a number of
students were taking more responsibility for their actions and displaying a greater
sense of caring for other people. In light of the research on factors influencing
engagement, all these shifts heighten the likelihood of the students engaging
with the school.
• Although academic outcomes were not assessed, anecdotally a number of teachers
reported improvements.
• Research shows the value of increasing the interaction between different ages in
building stronger communities. The program has set up relationships between
different age and socio-economic groups. The evaluation showed that both
students and mentors had benefited from these relationships with all the mentors
stating they enjoyed the activities they did with their students and most of the
students agreeing. All the students stated that they enjoyed having an adult as
a friend and in the focus groups mentors stated that they enjoyed coming to
understand the world their students inhabited and the challenges they faced.
• As in most schools, records at Baimbridge indicate that boys are over represented
in terms of behavioural issues leading to time outs and suspension. The findings
show boys responded well to the support and encouragement afforded to them in
a mentoring relationship. There have been a number of girls in the program and

Conclusions
Standing Tall 11
the report discusses possible reasons why their mentoring relationships have not
lasted as long and have not had the same impact.
• The program has worked closely with personnel in the school with both teachers
and coordinators making referrals. Personnel in the school had seen that the
mentors complemented their roles in the school with the school principal stating:
The program has provided a support mechanism for students in the
Hamilton community that was sadly lacking. The connection between
the school and the community has been an additional benefit, providing a
shared appreciation of the needs of some young people.
Feedback from other schools in the Barwon South West Region indicated that
the concept of mentoring could be of value in confronting the challenges they
faced.
• All the mentors stated that the program was clear about its goals and focus and
they were clear about their role with most stating that the training was of value.
All stated that they felt supported by the program and would like to stay in the
program.
• Feedback from agencies working with young people and the Local Learning and
Education Network indicated their belief in the value of community involvement
in the support of young people.
These findings show that energising and engaging the community through
a mentoring program can assist schools to find proactive ways to address
disengagement. It would appear that there is truth in the statement made by the
Mayor of the Southern Grampians Shire during Youth Mentoring Week 2007:
General observations
The Standing Tall program is a great example of how a community
can form a partnership with a school to give young people a chance to
fulfil their potential. The program also allows for community building
and a real sense of achievement for the students and the mentors
involved in the program. It helps to show young people that they live
in a community that cares and that they are never alone. It brings out
the true sense of community and it will hold residents of the Southern
Grampians Shire in good stead in the future.
Engaging and energising the community to support young people through schoolbased
mentoring is an attractive idea. The appreciation of the program by personnel
at Baimbridge College and the strong response from other schools in the region
would indicate that the idea resonates with personnel working in a system where

Standing Tall 12
they are pressured to achieve better educational outcomes but have to grapple
with the realities of the many challenges faced by students which impedes their
ability to engage with what is offered. Disengagement of students, which often
presents itself in schools as challenging behaviours, can be a tremendous drain
on the resources of a school. Research shows the importance of students feeling
valued and connected in a supportive environment. Mentoring offers a possibility
for the community to support schools in reaching their objectives. However, such
an opportunity for beneficial partnership between the school and community must
not be squandered, and careful consideration must be paid when of setting up such
programs with best practice adhered to so the best possible outcomes are achieved.
Recommendations
Endnotes
• That school based mentoring be considered by the education sector, the
business sector and the community as a worthwhile intervention to energise
the community to support young people to take full advantage of their
education
• That school based mentoring programs be based on what has been identified
as best practice
• That program co-coordinators of school-based mentoring programs be
supported to develop appropriate skills, knowledge and resources
• That school-based mentoring programs have a good understanding of schools
and be able to communicate the value of mentoring so that mentoring is
accepted as a credible practice in enabling schools achieve their outcomes
• That there be a understanding that school-based mentoring programs are
complex and take time to develop in order to be effective
• That there be further research on the different aspects of school based
mentoring to further increase its effectiveness as an intervention of value.
1. Butler, H et al, (2006) Doing it Differently: Young People’s Engagement with School on behalf of Anglicare Victoria,
Brotherhood of St Laurence and Centre for Adolescent Health.
2. Dusseldorp Skills Forum and Australian Industry Group,2007, It’s Crunch Time. Raising Youth Engagement and
Attainment.
3. Dusseldorp Skills Forum, (2007) How Young people are Faring, At a Glance.
4. Henry J et Al (2003) Connecting through the Middle Years Phase Two Evaluation.
5. Dubois,D, Karcher,M (2005) Handbook of Youth Mentoring, Sage Publications, USA, p31.

Chapter 1
The Social Context
for Young People
Many things can wait. The child cannot. Now is
the time that his bones are being formed, his blood
is being made, his mind developed. To him we
cannot say tomorrow. His name is today.
Standing Tall 1
Gabriela Mistral

Standing Tall 1
Social and emotional well-being of adolescents
Introduction
Aiming to capture a true picture or the well-being of young people in Australia has
been the focus of a number of reports and research endeavours in the last decade.
This information is of vital interest to the general community, but particularly to
government bodies identifying areas of concern and making decisions regarding
future planning.
Epidemiologist Richard Eckersley states:
The orthodox view of the health and well-being of young Australians
has been one of continuing improvement. [However] the ‘big picture’
of the health and well-being of young Australians is marked by
contradiction and ambiguity. Young people are portrayed as having the
time of their life or struggling with life in their times. 1
Research findings
A 2008 report The State of Victoria’s Young People prepared by the Departments
of Education and Early Childhood Development, Planning and Community
Development found that overall, the evidence points to a conclusion that, even
though there are concerns in the areas of substance abuse and mental health,
young Victorians are faring well across the broad domains of health, learning,
development safety and well-being with 70 percent of young people rating their
health as ‘excellent’ or ‘very good’. It bases its optimism on the reversal in the
trends of youth suicide and drug related deaths and a drop in the deaths resulting
from road accidents. 2
In a report for Australia 21 a non-profit company whose core business is research
and development on issues of strategic importance to Australia in the 21st Century
Eckersley challenges what he terms as the ‘orthodox position’ by stating that it:
Overestimates the importance of declining death rates and
underestimates that of the adverse trends in a range of non-fatal, chronic
health problems, especially mental disorders. 3
This is echoed by other researchers, social commentators and personnel working
with young people who are concerned with the well-being of young people in our
society. Australian academics Fiona Stanley, Sue Richardson and Margot Prior ask
the following question in their book Children of the Lucky Country? (2005):
If Australia is so well off why isn’t the picture for our children more
hopeful, just and optimistic? 4
They believe that what is happening in Australia is similar to a phenomenon which
Canadian researchers have called ‘Modernity’s Paradox’. Their research found that:
…in spite of the increasing economic prosperity and ‘globalisation’
enabling greater success and opportunities, many of the key indicators
of the health development and well-being of their children are not
improving and many are worsening. 5

Standing Tall 1
In Australia, two leading experts in adolescent mental health, Professor George
Patton of Victoria’s Centre for Adolescent Health and well known adolescent
psychologist, Michael Carr Gregg, have identified adolescence as a time of
particular vulnerability. Patton has stated that the lifestyle of adolescents today
has created a wide array of emotional stresses and difficulties for young people 6 and
Carr Gregg has observed that teenagers are the only age group in Australia whose
health status has not markedly improved over the last 40 years. 7
In 2007, the Australian Scholarship Group interviewed 10,000 Australian students
from Grade Prep to Year 12 resulting in a report The State of Student Social and
Emotional Health. Significantly the report found:
• a large number of students experience social and emotional difficulties
• social and emotional health decreases from primary to secondary school. 8
Australian Bureau of Statistics data has revealed 26 percent of young people aged
16 to 24 suffered a mental illness in 2007 9 and in 2008 face-to-face interviews
with 9000 Australians in the same age group, using World Health Organisational
diagnostic tools, revealed similar statistics with anxiety problems being the most
prevalent. 10
The 2008 Australian Institute of Health and Welfare report Making Progress stated
that the hospitalisation of for intentional self-harm has risen by a third in the last
eight years for girls aged 13 to 19 and in other literature, depression is cited as the
most frequently reported mental health problem in adolescents. 11
A study by Australian and United States researchers, involving 6000 students,
looked at under-age alcohol abuse and found that levels of binge drinking were
up to three times higher among Australian Year 9 students than their American
counterparts. 12
Overseas research by Collishaw et al (2004) and Hegell et al (2004) found that the
problems for 15-16 year olds had risen between 1974 and 1999 across all family
types and research by Rutter and Smith (1995) tends to support the view that
psycho-social problems have become more common in young people in recent
decades. 13
An interesting finding in the literature is that the psycho-social problems,
experienced by adolescents, are not just the domain of young people in low socioeconomic
groups. American studies by Luther (2003) show that children in affluent
families, usually seen as being at lower risk, may actually be more likely than other
children to suffer substance abuse problems, anxiety, and depression. He states this
could be due to:
• isolation from parents (both emotional and physical)
• excessive pressures to achieve. 14
In 2008 Martin Seligman, world renowned United States psychologist, worked
with the prestigious Melbourne private school Geelong Grammar to introduce a
special program to support students in dealing with what the school has identified
as the pressures of modern life: drug use, depression, obesity, alcohol abuse, eating
disorders, suicide, bullying and peer group pressure. 15 Seligman has been quoted as
saying he sees Australian youth ‘starving in paradise’. 16
It is clear that discussions concerning the well-being of youth has moved from
looking at an identifiable minority who are ‘at risk’ and requiring targeting, to the
mainstream of young people.

Standing Tall 1
Changes in society impacting on young people
Eckersley (2008) has looked at a wide range of literature analysing changes in
society which have affected young people. These changes include:
• changes in the world of family, work and education such as family conflict
and breakdown, poverty and unemployment, job stresses and insecurity and
education pressures
• environmental degradation, including widespread toxic chemical pollution,
which affects neurological development and immune function
• the emergence of a youth culture that isolates young people from adults and
increases peer influence
• increased media use and changing media content, linked to violence,
consumerism, loss of community and social cohesion, vicarious life
experiences, invidious social comparisons, and pessimism about global
conditions for both individual and global futures
• co-morbidity, especially between drug use and mental illness but also
between mental and physical problems such as the links between obesity and
depression and depression and heart disease
• the decline of religion, which ‘packages’ many sources of well-being,
including social support, spiritual or existential meaning, a coherent belief
system and a clear moral code
• changes in diet, which have been implicated in many chronic health
problems. For example, a large increase in the ratio of omega 6 to omega 3
fatty acids has been linked to cardiovascular disease and mood disorders. 17
Observers such as Fiona Stanley have noted other factors influencing the wellbeing
of the young people to be:
• family breakdowns
• father absences
• overworked or under worked parents
• high geographic mobility. 18
A 2007 report An Unexpected Tragedy by Relationships Forum Australia found that,
although the last three decades have been one of unambiguous prosperity, it has
come at a price. The report showed that the long and unsocial hours, demanded
by changed working patterns for many Australian workers, has resulted in added
pressure and reduced child well-being for many families. 19
Eckersley (2008) has concluded:
Notwithstanding all the complexity and uncertainties, the totality of
the evidence suggests that fundamental social, cultural, economic and
environmental changes in Australia and other Western societies are
impacting adversely on young people’s health and well-being. 20

The influence of materialism and individualism
Standing Tall 1
In a 2005 presentation on Mental Health Day at the Australian National
University, Eckersley explored the possibility of there being a strong interplay
between the mental health issues experienced by young people and the society in
which they find themselves. He stated:
Considerations of mental health are dominated by the medical model
that construes it in terms of individual attributes…as individual illness
requiring medical or psychological interventions. But we need to see
mental health as societal issue requiring societal change….change in
how we think about things; in how we see the world and our place in it;
in what we think makes life worth living. 21
As the main developmental task of adolescence is the formation of identity this
understanding has prompted commentators to explore the underlying thinking
patterns in modern Western culture which potentially can affect the well-being of
young people. Materialism and Individualism have been identified by the report
Flashpoints and Signposts—Pathways to Success and Wellbeing for Australia’s Young
People as two well researched forces in society which influence young people. 22
‘Materialism’ is defined in the report as ‘the pursuit of money and possessions’. 23
Bakan in his book The Corporation states that young people have grown up in
a world where they have been carefully groomed as ‘consumers’ and thus are
influenced by the messages and the images portrayed by the market. 24 For example,
in 2007, Mission Australia surveyed 28,000 young people from 11 to 24 and found
that body image was the major concern for all ages and sexes. 25 Paul Bird from
Mission Australia stated that this highlighted the ‘impact of image focused fashion
and marketing medias’. 26
Because the focus of materialism is the external goals of fame, fortune and
glamour, Maggie Hamilton (2008) found that it leaves a lot of young people
feeling inadequate. She states that clever marketers are well aware of the fears and
anxieties these feelings evoke and exploit them to boost sales. 27
Parents are well aware of these pressures. The research of Tucci et al (2005) found
that 80 percent of parents believed that their children were targeted too much by
marketers. 28 Martin Lindstrom, marketing guru of BRAINchild, sees that young
people are caught between personal anxieties and living in a fearful society. He
states:
Although this may be the most affluent generation to walk the planet,
it also has the dubious distinction of being the most insecure and
depressed. 29
Individualism is defined by the report Flashpoints and Signposts—Pathways to
Success and Wellbeing for Australia’s Young People as ‘the placing of the individual
at centre of a framework of values, norms and beliefs thus freeing people from
institutional arrangements ties and expectations’. 30 It goes on to say that this
allows freedom but it can also lead to insecurity and uncertainty because of a lack
of frames of reference. 31 Research by Beck and Beck-Gernsheim (2002) found that
it can also lead to a pressure to endlessly perform, achieve and re-invent oneself. 32
Hamilton and Dennis (2005) would argue that this takes place in a society where

Standing Tall 1
the market is continually working to make young people believe that they can ‘buy
an identity’. 33
Graham Rossiter, Director of the Cardinal Clancy Centre for Research at the
Australian Catholic University Sydney is quoted as saying:
Impact on schools
Endnotes
Young people feel caught in a bind—that the culture in which they live
glorifies individualism and the commercial world does everything it can
to make individuality a marketable commodity. 34
These societal challenges form the environment in which schools operate. In 1999
Eckersley polled almost 100 teachers in ACT colleges (years 11-12) on what they
observed about the social and emotional well being of young people. Of those
interviewed 81 percent stated they believed the well-being of young people had
declined. 35
Many educators are realising that if young people are going to benefit from what
schools have to offer, it cannot just be ‘business as usual’.
The Flashpoints and Signposts Report suggests a number of recommendations for
those working with young people. It states consideration should be given to:
• the ‘big picture’ of broad social changes reshaping life today
• holistic approaches to health and well-being (rather than just focus on ill
health)
• a whole of population approach versus just concern for marginalised at risk
• consideration of social and cultural resources as well as material and economic
resources. 36
1. Eckersley, R. 2008 (in press) ‘The health and well-being of young Australians: Patterns, trends, explanations and
responses’. In DL Bennett, SJ Towns, Elliott, EL, Merrick J. Challenges in adolescent health: An Australian perspective,
Victoria, BC: Int Acad Press.p1.
2. Department of Education and Early Childhood Development and Department of Planning and Community
Development. The State of Victoria’s young people. A Report on how young people aged 12- 24 are faring. Executive Summary.
3. Eckersly,R 2008 Never better—or getting worse? The health and well-being of young Australians. Report for
Australia21, Canberra.
4. Stanley, F. Richardson S and Prior M, 2005, Children of the Lucky Country? Pan Macmillan, Sydney. p1.
5. Ibid, p2.
6. Shields, Jane. 23 July 2006, ‘Coping by Cutting’ ABC Background Briefing.
7. ‘Children Raised on Mood Drugs’ Herald Sun 6th March 2005.
8. ASG. The State of Student Social and Emotional Health. Melbourne: Australian Scholarships Group, 2007. p5.
9. Stark,J, ‘Mental illness ravaging nation’s Youth’ The Age,Friday October 24 2008.

10. Ibid.
11. Australian Institute of Family Studies, Family Matters, No 49 Autumn, 1998, p11.
12. Baxter J, ‘Our children deserve and need a safe environment’ The Age 26th Mach 2008.
Standing Tall 1
13. Eckersley, R, Wiengara, A, and Wyn, J, 2006 Flashpoints &Signposts: Pathways to Success and Wellbeing for
Australia’s Young People, p16.
14. Ibid.
15. www.ggs.vic.edu.au
16. The Geelong Advertiser March 2008.
17. Eckersley, R. 2008 (in press). ‘The health and well-being of young Australians: Patterns, trends, explanations and
responses’. In DL Bennett, SJ Towns, Elliott, EL, Merrick, J. Challenges in adolescent health: An Australian perspective.
Victoria, BC: Int Acad Press. p7.
18. ‘The Crisis that Besets our Adolescents’ The Age 11 October 2003.
19. Relationships Forum (2007) An Unexpected Tragedy.
20. Eckersley, R. 2008 (in press). The health and well-being of young Australians: Patterns, trends, explanations and
responses. In DL Bennett, SJ Towns, Elliott, EL, Merrick J. Challenges in adolescent health: An Australian perspective.
Victoria, BC: Int Acad Press.
21. Eckersley, R, 2005, ‘Mental Health and the Interplay of Two World’. Address at Mental Health Conference, Centre
for Mental Health Research, Canberra.
22. Eckersley, R, Wiengara, A, and Wyn, J, 2006 Flashpoints & Signposts: Pathways to Success and Wellbeing for Australia’s
Young People, Project by Australia 21 and Australia Research Centre funded and supported by Vic Health. p33.
23. Ibid, p15.
24. Bakan, J, 2004, The Corporation. The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power, Penguin, Canada p136.
25. Cooke D, ‘Young take on the environment but its still looks that count’, The Age, December 4, 2007.
26. Ibid.
27. Hamilton, M, ‘The Trouble with Tweens’ (edited extract from What’s Happening to Our Girls Viking 2008) Good
Weekend, June 2008
28. Eckersley, R, Wiengara, A, and Wyn, J, 2006 Flashpoints & Signposts: Pathways to Success and Wellbeing for Australia’s
Young People, p15.
29. Hamilton, M, ‘The Trouble with Tweens’ (edited extract from What’s Happening to Our Girls Viking 2008) Good
Weekend, June 2008. ‘
30. Eckersley, R, Wiengara, A, and Wyn,J, 2006 Flashpoints & Signposts: Pathways to Success and Wellbeing for Australia’s
Young People, Project by Australia 21 and Australia Research Centre funded and supported by Vic Health. p33.
31. Ibid, p34.
32. Ibid.
33. Hamilton, C and Dennis, R, 2005, Affluenza. When too much is never enough, Allen & Unwin, Sydney, p7.
34. Doogue, G, 2005, ‘Imagine—Communities with Vibrant Hearts and Souls’, Communities in Control Conference Our
Community and Centacare Catholic Family Services.
35. Eckersley, R, 2004, Well and Good. How we feel and why it matters, Text Publishing Company, Melbourne, p156.
36. Eckersley, R, Wiengara, A, and Wyn,J, 2006 Flashpoints & Signposts: Pathways to Success and Wellbeing for Australia’s
Young People.

Standing Tall 20
Chapter 2
Schools
Genuine engagement with learning and with
others within the school environment is a key to
positive outcomes across a range of immediate and
long term health, academic and life outcomes.
Butler, H et al, (2006)
Doing it Differently: Young People’s Engagement with School

Society’s main investment in young people
Introduction
Standing Tall 21
The greatest investment made in young people by our wider society is in the
establishment of schools. In Australia it is compulsory for young people to attend
school with those young people spending close to half their waking hours in the
school environment. Society has the high expectation that teachers will prepare
young people to move into society with the skills and knowledge necessary for
them to function as competent members of the community.
The importance of education is emphasised in the report Doing it Differently: Improving
Young People’s Engagement with Schools prepared by Butler et al (2006) on behalf of
Anglicare Victoria, Brotherhood of St Laurence and the Centre for Adolescent Health:
Genuine engagement with learning and with others within the school
environment is a key to positive outcomes across a range of immediate
and long term health, academic and life outcomes. 1
Citing the OECD, engagement was defined as:
…a disposition towards learning, working with others and functioning
in a social institution which is expressed in students feeling that they
belong at school and in their participation in schools activities. 2
Disengagement in schools and retention rates
The It’s Crunch Time-Raising Youth Engagement and Attainment report published by
the Dusseldorp Skills Forum and the Australian Industry Group (2007) looks at
how young people are faring in the education system and highlights the fact that
a significant number of young people aged between 15 and 24 are not in full-time
learning or full-time work. 3 In another report by Dussledorp Skills How are Young
People Faring 2007: At a Glance, Professor Barry McGraw the former Director for
Education of the OECD observes that:
…while other OECD countries have managed to progressively and
incrementally improve school completion rates, the rates in Australia
have barely shifted in the last 15 years. 4
Many of these young people are disengaging from school early in the years of their
secondary education.
Educational researcher Beutel (2006) states:
Alienation and disengagement from schooling, shown by contemporary
early adolescents, are significant educational concerns both nationally
and internationally. 5

Standing Tall 22
This comes at a time when, because of changes in the workforce and the economy,
schools are expected to retain students for longer periods of time. The compulsory
age for leaving school in Victoria was raised to 16 in 2007.
In her research Boon (2008) found that the disaffection from school manifests
itself in high levels of absenteeism, disruptive classroom behaviour and exclusions
or suspensions from school 6 and she cites research which concludes that students
who leave school early have been shown to have an overall poorer quality of life.
Indicators of this include marginalised employment opportunities (McMillan
and Marks, 2003), delinquent activities (Lane 1999; Hinshaw, 1992; Rutter et al,
1998) 7 and psychological, social and financial adjustment issues (Chamberlain and
Mackenzie, 1996). 8
It’s Crunch Time Report has explored the economic benefits for Australian society
if the problem of retention of students in education could be addressed and cites
the Access Economics view that boosting the number of young people completing
school or apprenticeships to 90 percent would represent good value for the
investment required. It estimates the changes would:
• have the same positive impact on the economy as increasing Australia’s total
migrant intake by 180,000 over the same period to 2040
• boost GDP by 1.1 percent (equivalent to $9.2 billion in today’s money) by
2040—representing an extra $500 a year per Australian in today’s money. 9
Educational researchers Atweh et al (2007) have concluded:
Reasons for disengagement
Undoubtedly school retention is associated with student engagement;
the more that students are engaged in their education the greater is their
tendency to stay longer in school. 10
The need to understand why students disengage has become the focus of a
growing number of research endeavours. Boon’s research (2008) in three Northern
Queensland schools involved 1050 indigenous and non indigenous students aged
12 to 15 years. In regard to matters relating to disengagement she found:
Several important factors that lead to dropping out of school have been
identified. Of these, low academic achievement has been consistently
found to be the strongest predictor of dropping out of school. 11
Boon cites the works of Battin, Pearson et al (2000), Bradley (1992) Macmillan and
Marks whose research backs up this claim. 12 Of further interest is Boon’s conclusion
that the most important factor leading to low academic achievement is motivation
rather than low IQ. She cites Australian research by Candy and Baker (1992),
conducted in a school for students at risk characterised by low academic achievement,
which showed that 57 percent of the students had an average IQ while 30 percent
had above average IQ. This is further backed up by research done in the United
Kingdom by Solomon & Rogers (2001) which concluded that students in pupil
referral units, rather than lacking cognitive ability, lacked motivational and coping
strategies to support their learning. She also cites a meta analysis by American
researchers Sternberg, Grogorenko and Bundy(2001), who concluded that IQ
accounts for only 25 percent of the variance in schooling outcomes. 13

Standing Tall 2
Boon also found that school suspensions were a strong indicator of a young person’s
disaffection with school and having low academic achievement. The research of
Jimerson et al (2000), which found that a student’s adjustment to school can be
measured by the number of suspensions due to challenging behaviours, was also
cited. Boon concludes that, rather than socio economic or family factors, lack of
motivation and student suspensions are the greatest predictors of low academic
achievement and dropping out of school. 14
Engagement behaviours and attitudes
Adaptive
cognitive
dimensions
(Motivation)
In an attempt to capture the interplay of both the cognitive and behavioural
dimensions involved in a young person engaging or disengaging. Australian
educational researcher, Allan Martin, has come up with the following diagram:
Student Motivation and Engagement Wheel adapted from Martin (2003a) 15
Mastery orientation
Self-efficacy
Disengagement
Maladaptive
behavioural
dimensions
(Engagement)
Value of schooling
Self handicapping
Further
decline in
adaptive
motivation
Persistence
Uncertain control
Planning
Study
management
Anxiety
Failure avoidance
Adaptive
behavioural
dimensions
(Engagement)
Impeding
cognitive
dimensions
(Motivation)
Decline in
adaptive
motivation
Other researchers see engagement in terms of having needs met. North American
writers Brentro, Brokenleg & Van Bockern (1990), having worked with a number
of ‘at risk’ students, concluded that the certain needs must be met for young people
to engage positively with the world.
They identified these needs to be:
• the need to belong - to feel valued, connected, approved of and affirmed
• the need for mastery - to feel competent and able to achieve
• the need for independence - to feel a sense of control of their world

Standing Tall 2
• the need for generosity - to feel that they can make a contribution to the
well-being of others
The meeting of these needs, they argued, is essential for a young person to lead a
productive life and reach their potential. 16 The work of Brentro, Brokenleg and Van
Bockern is based on the work of psychologist Stanley Coopersmith who observed
four basic components of self esteem to be:
• significance found in the acceptance attention and affection of others
• competence developed as one masters the environment bringing innate
satisfaction and a sense of efficacy
• power shown in the ability to control one’s behaviour and gain the respect of
others
• virtue or worthiness judged by values of one’s culture and of significant
others. 17
Brento et al observed that young people will demonstrate certain behaviours and
attitudes depending on whether or not these needs are met. They also observed
that young people may try to address these needs in a distorted fashion leading to
maladaptive behaviours and attitudes. In a school setting, the attempt to address
the needs in a distorted fashion shows up as behavioural issues such as bullying,
attention seeking behaviours and disregard for authority.
The holistic approach of their work is captured in the Circle of Courage which is
based on Native American philosophies of child management. It sees young people
as being ‘encouraged’ if needs are met thus achieving an unbroken circle but
‘discouraged’ when the needs are not met and the circle broken.
The need for to feel valued
connected, approved of and
affirmed
The Circle of Courage
Belonging Mastery
Independence
The need to feel that one has
control of one’s world
The need to feel competent and
able to achieve
Generosity
The need to feel that one can make a
contribution to the well-being of others
Adapted from Circle of Courage material in Brentro,L, Brokenleg,M and Van Bockern,S, 1990,
Reclaiming Youth at Risk 18
Well-being and engagement
That fact that well-being issues have been considered in the development of school
programs, curriculum frameworks and professional standards would suggest that
educators are starting to see the strong link between social and emotional health

Standing Tall 2
and educational outcomes. The State of Student Social and Emotional Health Report
(2007) states:
Student social and emotional health is an important area of growing
focus within the community, Government and educational sector. Social
and emotional well-being is establishing itself as a permanent fixture
rather than a transitory blip on the radar screen. 19
The word widely used in educational circles to describe social and emotional wellbeing
is ‘resilience’, the ability to sustain or re-establish well-being, in order to
achieve positive outcomes, even in the face of challenging circumstances. Deveson
(2003) observed that it was initially believed that resilience was a quality only
some individuals possessed, but the turning point came when it was realised that
resilience could be fostered as it was an interaction between an individual and their
environment. 20
Deveson cites work by American researcher Sylvia Rockwell who identified four
myths that have prevented fostering resilience in young people in the past. These are:
• the myth of predetermination which states that people will never be able to
escape the cycles of violence, poverty or failure which have haunted the lives
of their parents
• the myth of irreparable damage which holds that some children can be so
damaged by an experience they have no hope for the future
• the label of identity which labels and dismisses people who are ill or at risk
rather than constantly engaging in a talent search and defining people in
terms of their strengths
• the myth that ultimately it doesn’t matter which claims that whatever is
done or not makes little difference in the final outcome. 21
The focus on ‘resilience’ appeared in research in the 70s and 80s and started to be
taken seriously in policy and practice in the 90s. One of the experts in the resiliency
field, Michael Resnick (2000) from Minnesota University, states that it came about
as a reaction to the pessimistic views the US government held at the time when
dealing with social issues and behaviours of ‘at risk’ young people. The resiliency
approach focus switched from a ‘nothing works’ attitude to asking ‘what works?’ 22
When Resnick and his team from Minnesota University wrote the largest and
most comprehensive study on adolescent health in the United States, arising
from National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (1997) they took a lot of
trouble to shape the national discourse from seeing young people as ‘problems to be
solved’ to ‘resources to be cherished, nurtured and developed’. 23
The new approach started to look at both protective and risk factors developing,
which Resnick describes as the ‘dual strategy which looks at reducing risk and
promoting protection’. 24
Risk factors in a school setting
Julia Tilling (2007), whose work focused on a group of boys likely to disengage
from school, has identified the qualities of a resilient young person to be:

Standing Tall 2
• social competence
• problem solving skills
• mastery
• autonomy
• sense of purpose and sense of future. 25
Students not displaying these attributes are seen as being ‘at risk’. Researchers
attempting to explain how these attributes are developed have looked at both the
behavioural and attitudinal characteristics of the individual and the environmental
factors of family, school and community, identifying the risk and protective factors
in both. For educators this task has been focused on school settings. Tilling
identified some of the risk factors to be:
• attention problems as a young child
• absenteeism
• behaviour problems
• social difficulties
• lack of connection with school-based extra curricula activities
• multiple retentions in same grade
• limited goals for the future
• lack of confidence. 26
In the report Doing it Differently: Improving Young People’s Engagement with Schools
young people identified some of the risk factors which could lead to disengaging
from school as being:
• a perception of the curriculum being boring or irrelevant
• limited opportunities to experience success, difficulties with literacy and
numeracy
• having no adults that knew them. 27
Educators have identified other factors which increase a young person’s risk of
disengaging. The years 5 to 9 (referred to as ‘The Middle Years’) is seen as a time
of heightened vulnerability. The report Doing it Differently Report: Improving Young
People’s Engagement with Schools states:
It has recently been demonstrated in Victoria, nationally and
internationally, that students’ attitudes, motivation and commitment to
school become increasingly less positive in successive years from year 5
to 9. 28
Researchers preparing a Youth Issues Report for the Southern Grampians and
Glenelg Primary Care Partnerships found, in discussions with marginalised
youth, that they tried to get through Years 6, 7 and 8 but had left by Year 9. 29 The
Department of Education Employment and Training strategic plan Middle Years:
A Guide for Strategic Action in Years 5-9 (1999) stated ‘up to 30 percent of students
were at risk of leaving before completing their secondary education’. 30
In addition boys are seen to be more at risk than girls. They rate more highly in the
statistics of student involvement in discipline issues, special needs and expulsion.
The State of Student Social and Emotional Health report found that the overall state
of boys’ social and emotional well-being is lower than girls. 31

Standing Tall 2
Tilling’s research (2007) explores reasons for the boys acting and reacting in ways
which lead to problems in a school setting. She found a boy’s understanding of
his masculinity can strongly influence his behaviour and that many boys with
behavioural problems were acting out what they conceived to be ‘traditional
masculinity’ as a means of personal empowerment. She also found that boys who
were repeatedly in trouble tended to be labelled and seen by schools as lost causes. 32
Tilling identified family circumstances and a lack of access to the external supports
and opportunities experienced by peers, as putting the boys she studied at risk. She
observed that the impact of all these factors produced boys who did not have the
‘personal resources to rise above their circumstances’. 33
Protective factors in a school setting
In light of the damage caused by risk factors and possible disengagement from
school, researchers have attempted to identify protective factors which can be
enhanced. Garmezy (1983) identified the protective factors as:
• positive peer and adult interactions
• a low degree of defensiveness and aggressiveness-high degree of co-operation
participation and emotional stability
• a positive sense of self
• an internal locus of control (a belief in a young person that they are capable of
exercising degree of control over their environment)
• a sense of personal power rather powerlessness
• a positive supportive family environment. 34
Resnick et al (1993) and Howard and Johnson (2000) identified the protective
factors to be:
• connectedness to family friends and school
• relationship caring adult
• support, belonging and role models
• self esteem
• handling demands of school
• belief in one’s own ability to cope
• individual disposition. 35
Young people in the report Doing it Differently; Improving Young People’s
Engagement with Schools identified a supportive school culture, a sense of belonging
and being valued as important protective factors. 36
The importance of relationships features in much of the literature. Resnick states
that the studies of resilient young people reflect the same kind of findings which
have been shown in the bonding and attachment literature of infancy. This
literature points to the importance of a close relationship with at least one caring
competent adult who values and recognises and rewards pro-social not antisocial
behaviour. 37 Educational researcher Smyth (2006) found:

Standing Tall 2
The most profound finding from a 3-year ARC Linkage Project with
DECS and SSABA is that young people give up on school when they
can’t form sustainable relationships with peers, adults and the institution
of school itself. 38
Professional Development programs in schools
A focus on the social and emotional needs of young people and the need to create
supportive environments has led educators to look closely at different aspects of
school environment which impinge on young people and have offered professional
development for interested teachers and administrators. Two professional
development activities presented in the Barwon South West Region of DEECD
in 2008 focused on the impact of the socio-economic backgrounds of the young
people who come into the school system and the discipline, policies and practices
which take place within a school.
Understanding Intergenerational Poverty
A Framework for Understanding Poverty was developed as a response to the
following statistics on the numbers of young people who fall within low socioeconomic
groups in the society. These are:
• 23 percent of families with children aged 5 12 are on low incomes
• 21 percent of families with children aged 13 19 are on low incomes 39
• in Australia 1 in 4 children are born to a single mother. Of those in1998 50.9
percent were employed in 2001 45 percent were employed
• in Australia 1 in 5 children are born into a jobless home
• jobless families outnumber dual-income families. 40
American educator Ruby Payne focuses on what she calls the different ‘hidden rules’
mind sets, norms and values of the groups who experience generational poverty and
contrasts them with the ‘hidden rules’ of the middle class which dominate the school
system. She holds that there is a clash between the two sets of rules. 41
Underpinning the ‘hidden rules’ of generational poverty is the strong sense that
one’s condition is based on chance which contrasts with a middle class belief that
there are choices in life. In situations with generational poverty children are seen
as possessions and there is a strong focus on the importance of relationships and
loyalty to the group. The language registers of generational poverty is often nonverbal,
sensory, reactive and casual often clashing with the more formal, abstract,
proactive language used in middle class institutions such as schools.
Relationships with others suffering generational poverty, particularly authority
figures, are based on one’s emotional responses and whether one likes a person.

Standing Tall 2
Payne argues that students from situations of generational poverty often base
their response to education on the relationships that they have with the teacher
and believes it possible that no significant learning takes places unless there is a
significant relationship and the student feels respected. 42
As education is seen as one of the key ways for students to move out of generational
poverty, the quality of relationships which students experience in a school setting
becomes one of great significance in order to access the possibilities education
might have for them.
The introduction of Restorative Practices
in discipline policies and practice
The second presentation Restorative Practices Behaviour Management by Queensland
psychologist Margaret Thorsborne looked at the discipline policies and structures
within a school. Traditionally many schools have modelled their policies on the
existing western criminal justice system adopting a quasi-judicial approach to the
management of student misconduct.
For a school this means:
• when codified rules have been broken sanctions must be applied to wrong
doers
• punishment is the best form of deterrence and it is important to send a clear
and strong message tho the school community
• if the authority of the school has been challenged control is to be restored and
maintained
• many suspensions and exclusions are the result of organisation convenience
due to the pressure of administrators to provide a quick fix
• justice is seen to be done through punitive sanction meted out by the
administrators often far removed from the incident as those affected by the
behaviours are excluded from decision about how to respond. 43
Thorsborne states:
Allied agencies such as police and welfare services have concerns that the
school system may contribute to an increase in crime with the use of such
sanctions rather than building a sense of community and citizenship. 44
Thorsborne goes on to observe that there is evidence that punitive forms of
discipline can result in the alienation and stigmatisation of wrong doers leading to
the formation of subcultures within and beyond the school which reject the norms
of acceptable behaviour as students attempt to address their need to belong and be
affiliated. This can work against the promotion of well-being and connectedness
which are vital if a young person is to take advantage of their education. 45
Restorative justice is seen as a having a different focus as the misbehaviour is seen
in terms of the way it affects relationships in the school community. It encourages
the young people to think of their actions in terms the well-being of the whole
community.

Standing Tall 0
It is based on the following premises:
• misconduct is a fundamental violation of people and interpersonal
relationships
• violations create obligations and liabilities
• restorative justice seeks to heal and put right the wrongs
• both the wrongdoers and the victims are dealt with. Victims are empowered to
have their needs met and to have their experience validated; wrongdoers are able
to tell their stories and are given the chance to make amends; the community of
care seeks ways to ensure that the incident does not happen again. 46
Schools that incorporate principles of restorative justice into student management
practices can:
• address the root causes of harmful behaviour rather that reacting to the
symptoms
• acknowledge that harm from incidents goes beyond just victims and
wrongdoers in the school community
• bring together the community responsible and accountable for the behaviours
so that resources and knowledge which would otherwise not be utilised can
be activated
• provide the necessary link between contemporary classrooms and pro-social
behaviour management processes across the school
• make the commitment of time necessary to repairing relationships instead of
going down the quick fix path. 47
Programs supporting well-being in schools
A number of major interventions in schools have been implemented and evaluated
to gain a better understanding of what schools can do to foster well-being.
Gatehouse Project
The 5-year Gatehouse Project, was set up in 1997 by the Centre for Adolescent
Health at the Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne. The aim of the study was to
determine the effect of a multilevel school-based intervention on the well-being
and health risk behaviours of young people by developing supportive environments
to promote their emotional and social well-being. It involved 12 intervention
schools and 14 control schools. The participants, 2678 Year 8 students, were
surveyed on three different occasions.
In the past, the health sector has invested considerable resources in the delivery by
schools of programs and curriculum packages focusing on reducing risk behaviours
as schools have near universal access to young people at a time in their lives when
the problems begin to emerge. 48
The Gatehouse Project came about because researchers found that the changes
in behaviour, as a result of curriculum packages implemented to address mental
health issues and risk type behaviours such as smoking and substance abuse, were

disappointing. They felt that this could be because the programs:
• tended to focus on categorised behaviours
• were frequently piecemeal and short term
• were considered extraneous to learning outcomes. 49
Standing Tall 1
The Gatehouse Project was one of the first projects to move away from addressing
‘at risk’ behaviour to concentrating on prevention or early intervention strategies.
It was based on the research of Rutter and colleagues (1979) which examined
the effect of the school ethos, particularly the quality of social relationships, on
educational achievements and socially disruptive behaviour. 50 Hargreaves et al
(1996) argued:
One of the most fundamental reforms needed in secondary or high
schools is to make schools into better communities of caring and support
for young people. 51
The project focused on a whole school approach because it believed that the
changing of whole school environments would be of greater value in addressing
issues of social and emotional well-being of young people. It was grounded in
sound public health and education practice. Three priority areas for action were
identified:
• building a sense of security
• enhancing skills and opportunities for good communication
• building a sense of positive regard through valued participation in aspects of
school life. 52
Researchers worked with schools to set up adolescent health teams which identified
the relevant risk and protective factors in the learning and social environment of
their particular school. These teams established priorities and then set up plans
focusing on policies, practices and organisation within their school environments
as well as encouraging the use of classroom materials focusing on well-being issues.
Evaluation of the project showed a 3 percent to 5 percent risk difference between the
intervention and control group in the health risk behaviours of smoking and drinking.
However, it found no significant effect that the intervention had on depressive
symptoms, social and school relationships even though the research team consistently
found relationships between teachers and students to be of paramount importance
when looking for factors that promoted the connectedness of students to school. 53
Project researchers Bond et al were aware of the strong association between
depressive symptoms and participants’ social relationships and they were
‘disappointed’ that the intervention did not appear to have any significant effect on
depression and related problems. They concluded that:
…the key determinants of depressive symptoms differ from those of
substance abuse and the intervention may not have been sufficiently
specific or sustained to produce an effect on these symptoms. 54
Advocacy Program
The Advocacy Program, developed by Brendan Schmidt, a Senior Project
Officer with the Department of Education and Training, was introduced by the
Department in 1997. The focus of the model was the setting up of one-to-one
relationships between ‘advocate’ teachers and Victorian Certificate of Education
students with the aim of raising retention rates and improving VCE results. The

Standing Tall 2
role of the ‘advocate’ teacher was to take responsibility for students in their care,
supporting them in a non-disciplinary, non- judgmental way according to their
individual needs. 55 The Teacher Manual for the program states:
The model is built on the supposition that the schools system currently
does not serve well all that travel with her. Deep misgivings about
school systems and the way they engage learners is the source of much
debate in most western education. 56
The value of the program was seen in the interaction of the one-to-one
relationship. Conversations between the teacher and the student could focus on
welfare and well-being issues as well as school and study issues. Well-being issues
were seen in terms of relationship conflicts, family, friends and school work. Study
and school issues were those related to the students’ work habits and academic
success. Welfare issues, focusing on such things as abuse, poor housing and serious
illness, were seen as the domain of the professional welfare staff. ‘Advocate’
teachers were given a time allowance to work with 10 to15 students. 57
The model for the Advocacy Program was based on the work of psychologist
Abraham Maslow (1954) who synthesised a large body of research related to
human motivation. He put forward the theory that humans have a hierarchy of
needs based on two groups deficiency needs and growth need, stating each need
must be met before the higher need is addressed. This means that the deficiency
need must be met before a growth need is addressed.
GROWTH NEEDS
Transcendence
Helping others to fulfil their potential
Self Actualisation
Realizing one’s potential
Aesthetic Needs
Need for order and beauty
Cognitive
Need to know and understand
DEFICIENCY NEEDS
Esteem Needs
To achieve, feel confident, gain approval and recognition
Connection and Acceptance Needs
A sense of being connected and being accepted by others
Safety Needs
Being secure and out of danger
Physiological Needs
Hunger, thirst, bodily comforts 58
Those who developed the model believed that these understandings have great
implications for those involved in the education and well-being of young people.
With the support of the Major Projects Division of the Department of Education,
Employment and Training the Advocacy Project was initiated at three secondary
colleges in November 1998. It involved students in the post-compulsory years
throughout 1999 and was extended to year 10, 11 and 12 students in a further
twelve secondary schools in the year 2000.

Standing Tall
The evaluation found a range of benefits for most students and teachers involved
in the program and that retention rates and results improved in the Victorian
Certificate of Education. Consequently the Advocacy Model was implemented
more widely and became associated with the Managed Individual Pathways
Initiative (MIPs), a later years program established by the Student Support and
Welfare Division of the Department of Education. Teachers from approximately
160 schools undertook training in 2001 to incorporate Advocacy in their MIPs
programs. 59
Connecting Through the Middle Years Project
The apparent success of the Advocacy Model led the Department of Education,
Employment and Training and VicHealth to implement the Connecting Through
the Middle Years Project, based on the same model but used for the middle years.
It was trialled in five schools during 2001 2002. This initiative became known
as ‘Phase One’ and was followed by ‘Phase Two’, in which a further 20 schools
participated.
The aims of the Project were to:
• improve the social connectedness of young people to schools through
promotion of a direct relationship between a teacher and a young person
• increase personal skills relating to self-understanding and to develop more
positive attitudes towards life-long learning
• promote and develop individual learning and pathways plans, leading to
individual learning programs and processes
• improve knowledge within the learning organisation of individual students
• develop and disseminate of support materials and approaches for teachers
working with young people. 60
Schools could use group interactions as well as the one-to-one interactions.
The Connecting Through the Middle Years: Phase Two Evaluation Report evaluated
the Project with the aim of assessing the potential of the Advocacy Model as an
early intervention strategy.
The findings included:
• students wanted to talk about well-being issues rather than school issues.
This led evaluators to recommend that social and emotional issues be the top
priority because they could, if not dealt with, become ‘barriers to learning’.
• the greatest value of the model was the one-to-one interaction with many
students saying that they had benefited from the interaction. However,
evaluators found that the group interactions did not come up with the
required outcomes and were seen as ‘futile’.
• students were able to identify that the qualities of a good advocate as showing
care, understanding, good communication skills and listening. 61
Teachers stated that one of the values of the program was that it brought to light
problems which staff had not known existed. This is not surprising in light of other
research. The State of Student Social and Emotional Health report, for example,
which found that there is a dissonance between the way students and teachers
perceive the emotional health of students with students reporting greater levels of
problems than those perceived by teachers. 62

Standing Tall
The Connecting Through the Middle Years: Phase Two Evaluation Report places the
program in the context of government policy, findings from other projects and
research in the education sector aimed at identifying policies and practices leading
to positive outcomes for young people. It indicated that the intervention took
place in the climate where the thinking around student welfare had shifted from
focusing on the behaviours of ‘at risk’ students to prevention, early intervention,
‘connectedness’ and well-being. This had been formalised in 1998 through The
Framework for Student Support Services in Victorian Government Schools. The
framework identified three levels to be established to support young people and
foster well-being.
LEVEL ONE - Primary Prevention
The establishment of strategies to develop a student’s sense of belonging to a
school community and their ability to deal with life circumstances including the
establishment of a ‘one-to-one relationship with a caring adult’.
LEVEL TWO - Early Intervention
The establishment of the provision of support and counselling at schools for those
vulnerable to harm.
LEVEL THREE - Postvention
The restoration of well-being by the provision of specialist professional services for
students with serious issues.
Other reports cited in the Evaluation are:
• The Prime Minister’s Youth Pathways Action Plan Taskforce. (2001d) which
recommended the establishment of policies, processes, protocols and practices
that enable early recognition of disconnectedness.
• The Full Service Schools Program (2001e) a major national project conducted by
the Commonwealth Department of Education, Training and Youth Affairs
and the study Under-age School Leaving (Brooks, Milne et al. 1997) both of
which focused on the importance of the school culture and positive student
–teacher relationships.
Research cited is
• studies by Holden and Dwyer (1992);Dwyer, Stokes et al. 1998; James,
St Leger et al (2001) which found that young people express a need for
interaction with caring and understanding adults who are willing to listen
• a report by Osterman(2000) where it was demonstrated through extensive
reference to studies conducted in the field of cognitive psychology, that
positive involvement with others is associated with engagement and success
• a study by Pomeroy (1999) in the United Kingdom which showed how
young people felt alienated by teachers who were abusive or treated them
dismissively and that a student’s decision to leave school prematurely was
strongly affected by these experiences. 63
The Evaluation Report observes that a ‘common thread’ that runs through projects
which, have apparently been successful is a ‘spotlight on one-to-one relationships
between a student and an adult’.

Conclusion
Endnotes
Standing Tall
The disengagement of a significant number young people in Australian schools
means that the tremendous investment placed in schools by the society is not being
fully realised.
The need to address this issue has led educators to look more closely at the
link between the well-being of young people and their educational outcomes.
In endeavouring to create supportive environments in school the importance
of relationships have come to be seen as playing a vital role and one-to-one
relationships with caring adults have been identified as one of the most important
protective factors for young people.
1. Butler, H et al, 2006, Doing it Differently: Young People’s Engagement with School, on behalf of Anglicare Victoria,
Brotherhood of St Laurence and Centre for Adolescent Health.
2. Ibid.
3. Dusseldorp Skills Forum and Australian Industry Group, 2007, It’s Crunch Time. Raising Youth Engagement and
Attainment.
4. Dusseldorp Skills Forum, 2007, How Young People are Faring, at a Glance.
5. Beutel,D, 2006, ‘Teachers understanding of pedagogic connections’, AARE Conference, Adelaide, p2.
6. Boon,H, 2008, ‘Risk or Resilience? What Makes a Difference?’ The Australian Educational Researcher, Vol 35, No 1,
p81.
7. Ibid, p82.
8. Ibid.
9. Dusseldorp Skills Forum and Australian Industry Group, 2007, It’s Crunch Time. Raising Youth Engagement and
Attainment.
10. Atweh, B et al, 2007, ‘School disengagement: its constructions, investigation and management’, AARE Conference,
Freemantle, p2.
11. Boon, H, 2008, ‘Risk or Resilience? What Makes a Difference?’ The Australian Educational Researcher, Vol 35, No1,
p83.
12. Ibid.
13. Ibid.
14. Ibid, p85.
15. Munns, G and Martin A 2005 . It’s all about MeE:A motivation and Engagement framework’, AARE Conference,
Parramatta, p1.
16. Brentro, L, Brokenleg, M and Van Bockern, S, 1990, Reclaiming Youth at Risk, National Education Service,
Bloomington, Indiana, p35.
17. Ibid.
18. Ibid, pp46 52.
19. Australian Scholarships Group. The State of Student Social and Emotional Health. Melbourne: Australian Scholarships
Group, 2007, p2.
20. Deveson, A, 2003, Resilience, Allen & Unwin, Sydney, p37.
21. Ibid, p128.
22. Resnick, M, Building 2000 ‘Resiliency—from Conception to National Agenda’ 3rd Pacific Rim Conference of the
International Association for Adolescent Health: Lincoln University, Christchurch, 25 28 June, p1.
23. Ibid.
24. Ibid.

Standing Tall
25. Tilling, J, 2007, At risk boys’ perceptions of masculinities and resilience. Thesis submitted to the Degree of Doctor of
Philosophy within the School of Education, University of Queensland, July, p92.
26. Ibid, p73.
27. Butler, H et al, 2006, Doing it Differently: Young People’s Engagement with School.
28. Ibid.
29. Gannon, K, 2004, Youth Issues Report, Southern Grampians & Glenelg Primary Care Partnership, Victoria, p7.
30. Henry J et al, 2003, Connecting Through the Middle Years Phase Two Evaluation.
31. Australian Scholarships Group, 2007, The State of Student Social and Emotional Health, Melbourne, p6.
32. Tilling, J, 2007, At risk boys’ perceptions of masculinities and resilience, Thesis submitted to the Degree of Doctor of
Philosophy within the School of Education University of Queensland.pp27-28
33. Ibid, p29
34. Ibid, p101.
35. Curriculum Corporation, 2001, Community Matters: Working with Diversity, Melbourne, Australia.
36. Butler, H et al, 2006, Doing it Differently: Young People’s Engagement With School.
37. Resnick, M, Building 2000 ‘Resiliency - from Conception to National Agenda’ 3rd Pacific Rim Conference of the
International Association for Adolescent Health: Lincoln University, Christchurch, 25 28 June, p2.
38. Smyth, J, 2006 ‘When students have relational power: the school as site for identity formation around engagement and
school retention’, AARE Conference, Adelaide p2.
40. Payne, K, 2006, A Framework for Understanding Poverty Workbook. Australia edition Social Solutions,Tasmania
41. Ibid.
42. Ibid.
43. Thorsborne, M and Vinegrad, D, 2006, Restorative Practices in Schools: Rethinking Behaviour Management Margaret
Thorsborne and Associates, Queensland, Australia.
44. Ibid.
45. Ibid.
46. Ibid.
47. Ibid.
48. Moodie, K and Hulme, A (eds), 2004, Hands-on Health Promotion, IP Communications, Melbourne, p300.
49. Ibid.
50. Rowling, L et al (eds) 2002 Mental Health Promotion and Young People. Concepts and Practice. McGraw-Hill,
Australia, p301.
51. Ibid.
52. Ibid, p 302.
53. Bond, L et al, ‘The Gatehouse Project—Can a multilevel school intervention affect emotional well-being and health
risk behaviours’, Journal of Epidemiology Community Health, 2004:58 p1002.
54. Ibid.
55. Henry J et al, 2003, Connecting Through the Middle Years Phase Two Evaluation. p7
56. Department of Education and Training (2001) Advocacy Manual Connecting young people to learning and life.
57. Ibid
58. Ibid
59. Henry J et al, 2003, Connecting Through the Middle Years Phase Two Evaluation p7
60. Ibid. p8
61. Ibid. pp39-52
62. Australian Scholarships Group, 2007, The State of Student Social and Emotional Health. Melbourne, p2.
63. Henry J et al, 2003, Connecting Through the Middle Years Phase Two Evaluation. pp13-15

Chapter 3
Mentoring
You make a living from what you get.
You make a life from what you give.
Standing Tall
Winston Churchill

Standing Tall
One-to-one relationships with caring adults
As the importance of well-being issues moves from the fringe to centre stage with
researchers, educators and policy makers coming to recognise the potential value of
one-to-one relationships in fostering well-being, the relationships students develop
with their teachers have gained heightened significance.
The Building Relationships. Making Education Work Report (2001a) produced
conjointly by the Australian Centre for Equity through Education and the
Australian Youth Research Centre had the importance of relationships as one if its
key findings. It focused on the student-teacher relationship and recommended that
schools needed to structure time for the development of this relationship. 1
This comes at a time when there is greater pressure on schools for comprehensive
internal accountability, external testing and an expectation that teachers develop
more complex learning plans to meet the needs of individual students because of
increased knowledge of pedagogy. It also comes at a time when, because of changes
in school structures, many teachers are given administrative roles in addition to
their responsibilities in the classroom. It is not surprising that one of the greatest
impediments seen in the Connecting in the Middle Years Program was the lack of time. 2
All educators would agree that the role of the teacher is central to the education of
young people and at all times are looking to ways to deliver a curriculum which is
relevant and engaging but when it comes to issues of well-being there is truth in
the statement made in the by Ken Donnelly in The Age in 2005:
Again and again teachers complain they are asked to be welfare workers,
counsellors, substitute parents and psychologists. We would agree that
the role of teaching is complex and far more than just teaching. However
we would all agree that we cannot give support to all our students. 3
In her report on the Gatehouse Project Glover states:
While we acknowledge that schools play an important role in fostering
the emotional well-being of our young people, schools cannot be
expected to do this alone without adequate resources. 4
As the well-being of young people has wide societal implications it is appropriate
that there be creative ways for the community to support schools create
environments in which young people can flourish. The Curriculum Corporation
publication Community Matters (2001) states:
It is essential that the social and emotional well-being of students is supported
by valuing the connectedness to ‘community’ outside the school, as well as
developing a sense of connectedness within the school community. 5

Mentoring
Standing Tall
In such a climate the concept of mentoring for young people can play a valuable
role, as it also focuses on the value of the one-to-one interaction, but suggests
that that relationship can be with a suitable adult, not necessarily a teacher. Youth
mentoring has been defined by the MENTOR/National Mentoring Partnership in
the United States as:
A structured and trusting relationship that brings young people together
with caring individuals who offer guidance, support and encouragement
aimed at developing the competence and character of the mentee. 6
Informal mentoring takes place in many young people’s lives through support
received from such people as sport coaches, neighbours, family friends and
others. However, there are many young people who could benefit from having the
same support but do not have that same interaction within the community. As
a result formal mentoring programs have developed to address this need. These
programs recruit and train members of the community to provide support to young
people. Mentoring relationships are different from the other possible professional
relationships young people may experience with youth workers, counsellors,
police or social workers in that the mentors are usually volunteers who provide an
emotional and social element to the relationship.
Mentoring has a long history in both Canada and the USA. The largest single
agency, Big Brother/Big Sisters started as a community based mentoring program
over 100 years ago in the US. It now has 500 agencies in the United States and 170
agencies in Canada. MENTOR/National Partnership has been in operation for
the last 15 years and now has over 4,000 affiliated programs in 23 states.
Historically, mentoring programs have been initiated as a response by members of
the public perceiving a need. Big Brothers/Big Sisters was formed in 1904 by Eric
Coulter who, as a clerk in the New York court system, observed that thousands of
children passed through the system with little support. He called on men in the
community to become involved and become mentors to the young people. Two
Wall Street businessmen, Geoffrey T Boisi and Raymond G Chambers, founded
the MENTOR/National Mentoring Partnership in 1990 after becoming aware
that many young people felt isolated from society, economically cut off and unable
to take advantage of the opportunities offered by society.
Mentoring is based on the belief that a strong and lasting connection between a
young person and a competent caring adult has the potential to assist with a young
person’s psychological growth and adjustment. 7 Spencer (2006) sees this comes
about because a mentor, in coming to know a young person well, understands the
challenges faced by the young person but also the strengths they possess and with
this knowledge is able to give the appropriate support. 8 Wiengera’s research (2002)
found that young people make stories of their lives and she sees the importance
of young people having access to the stories of others, especially older people,
who have had many different experiences in the world and can give different
perspectives. She states:
Stories show the difference between ability to be pro-active or re-active,
the ability to have some mastery of the journey, to act powerfully within
(and on) the world or be tossed around by winds and tides. Individual

Standing Tall 0
Recreating the village
Intergenerational practice
stories are the conduits that make past and present experience,
encounters and engagements into future possibilities for action. 9
Wiengera believes that young people also need to have their own stories heard. In
her research she found that there needs to an environment of mutual trust for this
sharing to take place and the trusting relationships formed in mentoring can play a
vital role. 10
Pacarelli (1998) states:
Regardless of the themes that brings together the mentor and the
protégé we are learning that these powerful relationships have
significant impact in helping youth find a place in the world. A purpose
for believing in self. 11
In a presentation at to the Hamilton campus of RMIT University in 2008 Martin
Mulligan, Deputy Director of the Globalism Institute at RMIT University,
observed that, in an increasingly globalised world where boundaries are more fluid,
the need for ‘community’ has increased rather than faded because of people’s need
to develop a sense of belonging and identity. Mulligan has noted that communities
are never static and ‘community’ is a dynamic term. As connection is the basis of
community such an observation would imply that there needs to be innovative and
creative ways to structure and support such connections. 12
Hugh Mackay, well-known Australian researcher and social commentator, states
every society has a ‘guiding story’. He has observed:
We need a new guiding story. Rebuilding the health and strength of our
human relationships is a good place to start. 13
Setting up mentoring relationships also sits well with an increasing interest in
programs which encourage interaction between members of different generations
known as intergenerational practice. This has been researched by Dr Judith
MacCallum of Murdoch University. She says that the interest has come about
because:
Young people’s social problems, issues and needs are largely seen as
a reflection of their declining levels of inclusion in civic life, a loss of
community, a failure on the part of local associations to encourage
social cohesion at the local level and a growing distance between the
generations. Intergenerational practice aims to put young people in
contact with older people in the community. 14

Her research found that programs which were effective in developing
intergenerational practice were able to:
• strengthen resilience in young people
• build networks of interconnection for young people
• help develop understandings in both the young people and the older
• generations
• help develop a sense of community. 15
As MaCallum states:
Research on benefits of mentoring
Standing Tall 1
According to those advancing this style of social policy something that
has gone awfully wrong with the social fabric, community participation
is dropping and different generations are becoming cut off from each
other. The answer is often seen to be in interventions that develop social
capital, build community capacity, encourage partnerships, and support
community enterprise. 16
A number of research projects have looked at the benefits of mentoring. At a cost
of US $2 million Public/Private Ventures, an independent social research agency,
evaluated eight Big Brothers/Big Sisters programs across America over 18 months.
The young people involved were aged 10 16 years with 60 percent of which were
boys and most from single parent families. The Making a Difference Report Tierney
et al (1995) was the result of this research. The study showed young people who
had been mentored:
• were 46 percent less likely to initiate drug use than the control group
• were 27 percent less likely to initiate alcohol use than the control group
• were 33 percent less likely to hit someone than the control group
• skipped half as many days of school than the control group
• developed higher levels of trust with their parents than the control group
• had improved relationships with their peers better than the control group. 17
Little (1990) and Roberts and Cotton (1994) express concern about the limitations
of available data on mentoring outcomes for individual young people in the
Australian literature and the difficulties of evaluating such outcomes. However, the
benefits which have been highlighted in international literature include:
• increased retention and participation (Bein 1998) (Schumer 1994) (Tierney et
al 1995)
• improved grades (Bein 1999)
• improved problem solving skills (Pascarelli 1998)
• enhanced of self confidence (Pascarelli 1998)
• higher self worth and motivation (Miller 1998) (Roberts and Cotton 1994)
• reduced feelings of sadness and loneliness (Rogers and Taylor 1997)

Standing Tall 2
• increased competence and self assurance in new situations (Hamilton and
Darling 1989)
• improved refusal skills regarding alcohol, tobacco and other drugs (Rogers
and Taylor 1997) 18
Research by Grossman and Tierney (1998) found that mentees reported better
relationships with parents and peers and greater feelings of openness and trust than
those in the control group. 19 Rhode’s research also found that mentoring increased
the levels of intimacy, communication and trust that adolescents experienced with
parents, increasing their sense of worth and scholastic achievement. 20
Some studies claim that mentoring can achieve what other interventions cannot.
For three years Aseltine et al (2000) looked at interventions aimed at reducing
drug and alcohol use in a group of 400 sixth grade students in Springfield
Massachusetts. The different interventions were:
• a mentoring program
• a community service with elderly
• a life skills curriculum in a school.
Evaluation showed that mentoring was associated with significantly lower levels
of problem behaviour and substance use and significantly higher levels of self
confidence, self control, cooperation and attachment in both the schools. In
contrast, few positive were observed emanating from the life skills curriculum or
community service activities. 21
Model of youth mentoring
Rhodes (2005) has put forward a model of youth mentoring which shows how
mentoring relationship may promote positive outcomes for young people through a
range of processes which foster social-emotional, cognitive and identity development. 22
Mentoring
relationship
Model of Youth
Mentoring
Figure 3.1
Rhodes(2005)
g
aaa
Mutuality
Trust
Empathy
g
c
e
b
d
Parental peer relationships
Parent and peer relationships
Social-emotional
development
Cognitive development
Identity development
Moderators
Mediator
Positive
Outcomes
eg grades,
emotional well
being, identity
development
Interpersonal history, social competencies, developmental stage, duration of the mentoring relationship, program
practices, family and community context

Mentoring in Australia
Standing Tall
Rhodes places the model in the context of a number of psychological theories that
have helped explain the possible value and impact of mentoring. These are:
1) The attachment theory which states that children form their conceptions of
relationship through early experiences with primary care givers, who John
Bowlby called ‘attachment figures’. These relationships, if positive, can lead
to a young person feeling that they are worthy of love and support thus
developing sense of worth. On the other hand, unreliable care givers who do
not develop this in young people can develop working models which influence
young people, at an unconscious level, not to trust relationships. Rhodes
explains that attachment issues become more salient in adolescence and
adolescents with deep seated insecurities are more vulnerable to self-criticism
and distress. She sees that within a mentoring relationship, strategies can be
explored to cope with distress and mentors can actually become alternative or
secondary attachment figures.
2) The looking glass self theory of sociologist Charles Horton Cooley which states
that significant others become the social norms by which adolescents look to
form opinions of themselves. As a mentor can become the ‘significant other’
for a young person they can have a tremendous influence on a young person,
once a trusting relationship is formed, because their perspective of value can
build a sense of self worth. This can change the way a young person feels that
other significant people in their lives, such as teachers, peers and parents,
think about them.
3) The zone of proximal development theory of Russian psychologist L S Vygotsky
which states that mental and emotional capacities of a young person can grow
when working under the guidance of an adult or more capable peer leading to
what Rhodes refers to as a ‘psychological stretch’ and learning taking place. 23
MacCallum and Beltman see the value of mentoring in terms of a mentor acting
as a role model for a young person. Mentors can model new behaviours and, if as
trusting relationship is formed, can encourage and support a young person if they
are motivated to change. 24
In Australia enthusiasm for mentoring has grown in the last five years with the
development of a National Mentoring Strategy and the establishment of a National
Youth Mentoring Network supported by Big Brothers Big Sisters, Dusseldorp
Skills Forum and The Smith Family in conjunction with the Federal Government.
The Victorian State Government, through the Office of Youth, has established
Leading the Way: the Victorian Government’s Strategic Framework on Mentoring Young
People 2005 2008. In 2006 the Victorian Youth Mentoring Alliance was formed.
Mentoring has received support from politicians and other influential individuals
in the society. In 2006 Governor of Victoria Professor de Krester became the
patron of the Victorian Youth Mentoring Alliance and in 2007 he hosted a
celebration of Youth Mentoring in Victoria at a function at Government House
during the inaugural Youth Mentoring Week in that State. At the inauguration of
the National Youth Mentoring Network Michael Jeffries, Governor-General at
the time, made the following statement:

Standing Tall
Best practice in mentoring
As the enthusiasm for the potential impact of mentoring grows, it is imperative
that an understanding of best practice also grows. Spencer warns simply matching
a young person with an adult does not necessarily yield hoped for benefits. 26
Rhodes and Dubois (2006) argue that there needs to be a better alignment between
research and practice in the area of youth mentoring so that policies lead to the
encouragement of intentional and scientifically informed approaches to mentoring
promotion and the replication of programs that have been vigorously evaluated. 27
Jeffries warned:
I particularly admire the effectiveness of mentoring young Australians.
Who would not prize programs that elevate academic skills, eliminate
low self esteem, reduce social isolation and open doors to choice,
independence, to the maturing of interpersonal skills and to a better life.
25
If the power of mentoring is to be achieved the good intentions of staff
and volunteers are not enough. Good intentions must be supported by
solid structures and effective practice ‘Good news stories’ will not be
enough to generate the money, skilled practitioners and community
support to bring this powerful intervention to its full potential. 28
If decision makers are to recognise the value of mentoring they need to know of
the benefits for young people and the possible contribution it can make in the
areas of education, and public health. Dubois and Karcher (2005) believe that if
the potential of mentoring is to be reached it is important that there be effective
evaluation of the impact of mentoring and the elements of best practice in
developing effective relationships. 29
Areas which need to be looked at are:
• practices which make them programs effective and sustainable
• qualities and practices of adults who build successful relationships with young
people
• potential reasons for the possible failure of relationships
• effective evaluation to identify the benefits and impact of mentoring.
Mentoring has a number of stakeholders to whom this is vital. These are:
• policy makers who need to see how mentoring could contribute to what
they want to achieve in areas such as education, welfare and the building of
community to ensure that appropriate policies are developed to guide the
future of mentoring
• potential funders who need to have a clear picture of the contribution that
mentoring can make to the challenges faced by the community and thus being
worthy of their support. This involves both government and non-government
bodies

Standing Tall
• community members who are the source of the mentors They need to have
a strong idea of the impact of mentoring and what is expected of community
member who wants to become involved.
Research into best practice
It takes significant time and effort to set up effective and sustainable mentoring
programs and it is important to have the information and research which is
appropriate to the Australian context. Mentoring Australia has identified the
following benchmarks for the establishment of an effective mentoring program:
• a statement of purpose
• policy and procedures
• a recruitment and selection process for mentors
• mentor training
• mentor/mentee matching and monitoring strategy
• mentor/mentee support
• closure policy
• evaluation and assessment. 30
Sipe (1998) identified the following as the most important practices leading to
attracting appropriate mentors and establishing effective relationships as being:
• effective screening
• appropriate training
• support for mentors. 31
All these practices are developed to achieve the key purpose of mentoring, the
development of an emotional bond between a young person and a caring adult
through the establishment of a strong and effective relationship.
Rhodes (2002) observed that unless this bond is formed none of the benefits
attributed to the mentoring process are likely to accrue. She cites Herrera who
studied 600 pairs and found that a trusting bond was the most important factor. 32
Research has identified different indicators of the likelihood of this happening.
These are:
• the qualities of the relationship
• the focus of the relationship
• the length of the relationship.
Qualities of the relationship
As the relationship is the core of mentoring, knowledge of what constitutes
effective behaviours, attitudes and activities which maximise the likelihood of
enhancing the relationship is of paramount concern. Rhodes (2005) in forming her
model of youth mentoring stated:

Standing Tall
Focus of the relationship
This model assumes that the dynamics through which mentoring
relationships can promote positive developmental outcomes are unlikely
to unfold without a strong interpersonal connection, specifically one
characterized by mutuality, trust and empathy. 33
Spencer (2006) identified qualities and practices which are important as being
authenticity, empathy, pleasurable experiences and shared meaning. 34 Sipe (1998)
found that a wide range of studies and research showed that effective mentors are
more likely to engage in the following behaviours:
• making a commitment to being consistent and dependable to maintaining a
steady presence in the youth’s life
• respect for the youth’s viewpoint
• being open and flexible
• involving the youth in deciding how the pair will spend their time together
• paying attention to a young person’s ‘need’ for ‘fun’
• seeking and using the help and advice of program staff.
In contrast less effective mentors:
• do not meet with their mentees regularly
• adopt an authoritative role
• emphasise changes to behaviour more than developing mutual trust and
respect. 35
Spencer (2007) has also identified factors which often leading to the failure of
relationships. These are:
• unrealistic expectations of how close a relationship will be and how quickly
the young person will change
• the need to feel good about the relationship
• preconception of what is going on for a young person based on their
backgrounds
• being overwhelmed by needs of a young person. 36
One of the most important elements of mentoring is the focus of the relationship.
Rhodes and Dubois (2006) found that there are several lines of research to show
the greater effectiveness of what has been termed as the ‘developmental’ approach’
i.e. focusing on the needs of the young person rather than a ‘prescriptive’ approach
which focuses on changing the young person with a prescribed agenda. 37
Research by Adams (2006) focused on a mentoring program which had been set
up by the District Truancy Services Body in Tasmania, in an effort to reduce
truancy. It was found mentees in the program were resistant to changing their
behaviour in the way the mentors wanted them to. She cites Gay and Stephenson
(1998) who found that mentoring which prioritises the aim of a program is likely

Conclusion
Standing Tall
to be less successful because it tends to evoke resistance rather than an attitude of
compliance. 38
Jekielek et al (2002) report on a nine-month study of 82 Big Brother/Big Sisters
matches which found that matches based on a prescriptive approach developed
growing tension which end up, in some cases, to the ending of the relationship.
Two-thirds of the relationships with this approach ended nine months after the
first interview whereas only 10 percent of the relationships with the developmental
approach failed. 39
Length of the relationship
Endnotes
The length of the mentoring relationship has being identified as an important
factor on the impact of a mentoring relationship. Grossman and Rhodes (2002)
found that the positive impact of mentoring relationships became stronger as
the relationships developed over time and lasted longer that one year. They also
observed that relationships which lasted less than six months actually led to
declines in some areas in comparison to the control group. 40
Both psychological theories and research evidence point towards the fact that
the establishment of one-to-one relationships between young people and caring
members of the community, through mentoring, can make a valuable contribution
in the search for proactive ways to support young people. However there is
also evidence that the potential of that contribution is unlikely to be realised if
programs are not based on best practice.
1. Henry J et al, 2003, Connecting through the Middle Years Phase Two Evaluation.
2. Ibid.
3. Ken Donnelly, The Age, September 17, 2005.
4. Glover, S, Burns, J, Butler, H, Patton, G, 1998, ‘Social Environments and the Emotional Well being of Young People’.
Family Matters No 49 Autumn. p16.
5. Mind Matters, Community Matters: Working with Diversity for Well-being 2001,Curriculm Corporation, Melbourne,
Australia.
6. Dubois, D, Karcher, M, 2005, Handbook of Youth Mentoring, Sage Publications, USA, p4.
7. Macullum, J and Beltman, S, 2002, Role Models for Young People. What makes an effective role model program? Canberra:
NYARS, Commonwealth Department of Family and Community Services, p35.
8. Spencer, R, 2006, ‘Understanding the Mentoring Process between Adolescents and Adults’ Youth and Society Vol 37 No
3, 2006, p310.

Standing Tall
9. Wiengara, A, 2002, ‘Losing and Finding the Plot. Storying and the value of listening to young people’. Scottish Youth
Issues Journal, Issue 4, Summer, p11.
10. Ibid, p12.
11. Macullum, J and Beltman, S, 2002, Role Models for Young People. What makes an effective role model program? Canberra:
NYARS, Commonwealth Department of Family and Community Services, p24.
12. Mulligan, M, presentation to MELA at RMIT University, Hamilton, 2008
13. Tanner, L, 2003, Crowded Lives, Pluto Press, North Melbourne, p35.
14. MacCallum, J et al, 2006, Community Building through Intergenerational Exchange Programs, Canberra: NYARS,
Commonwealth Department of Family and Community Services. Executive Summary, xii.
15. Ibid, xvii.
16. Ibid, xii.
17. Baldwin, J,et al, (1997),Mentoring - A Proven Delinquency Prevention Strategy, Office of Juvenile Justice and
Delinquency Prevention Bulletin, April 1997.
18. Macullum, J and Beltman, S, 2002, Role Models for Young People. What makes an effective role model program? Canberra:
NYARS, Commonwealth Department of Family and Community Services, p24.
19. Rhodes, J, 2002, Stand By Me. The Risks and Rewards of Mentoring Today’s Youth, Harvard University Press, USA,
p35.
20. Ibid.
21. Aseltine, R, Dupre, M and Lamlein, P, 2000, ‘Mentoring as a drug prevention strategy: an evaluation of Across Ages’,
Adolescent and Family Health, Vol 1, pp11 20.
22. Dubois, D and Karcher, M, 2005, Handbook of Youth Mentoring, Sage Publications, USA, p32.
23. Rhodes, J, 2002, Stand By Me. The Risks and Rewards of Mentoring Today’s Youth, Harvard University Press,
USA,pp39-43
24. Macullum, J and Beltman, S, 2002, Role Models for Young People. What makes an effective role model program? Canberra:
NYARS, Commonwealth Department of Family and Community Services.
25. Jeffries,M ,Admiralty House, 2006 - Inauguration of the National Youth Mentoring Network.
26. Spencer, R, 2006, ‘Understanding the Mentoring Process between Adolescents and Adults’. Youth and Society. Vol 37,
No 3, 2006, pp287.
27. Rhodes, JE and DuBois, DL, 2006, ‘Understanding and facilitating the youth mentoring movement’, Social Policy
Report, Vol XX, No.3, p13.
28. Jeffries,MAdmiralty House, 2006 - Inauguration of the National Youth Mentoring Network.
29. Dubois, D, Karcher, M, 2005, Handbook of Youth Mentoring, Sage Publications, USA, p3.
30. Mentoring Australia www.dsf.org.au/mentor/benchmark.htm
31. Sipe, C, 1998, ‘Mentoring adolescents: what have we learned?’, JB Grossman (ed), Contemporary Issues in Mentoring,
Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia.
32. Rhodes, J, 2002, Stand By Me. The Risks and Rewards of Mentoring Today’s Youth, Harvard University Press, USA, pp35-
36.
33. Dubois, D, Karcher, M, 2005, Handbook of Youth Mentoring, Sage Publications, USA, p31.
34. Spencer,R, 2006 ‘Understanding the Mentoring Process between Adolescents and Adults’ Youth and Society, Vol 37, No
3, 2006, pp287 290.
35. Sipe, C, 1998, ‘Mentoring adolescents: What have we learned?’ JB Grossman (ed), Contemporary Issues in Mentoring,
Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia.
36. Spencer, R, 2007, ‘A Qualitative Study of Youth Mentoring Relationship Failures It’s not what I expected’ Journal of
Adolescent Research, Volume 22, Number 4, pp341 349.
37. Rhodes, JE and DuBois, DL (2006) ‘Understanding and facilitating the youth mentoring movement’ Social Policy
Report, Vol XX, No.3,.p4.
38. Adams, R, 2004, Constructing Meaning from Mentoring: The Experiences of Mentors and Mentees (unpublished
Masters Thesis, Hobart).
39. Jekielek, S et al, 2002 ‘Mentoring: A Promising Strategy for Youth Development’ Child Trends Research Brief, February
2002.
40. Rhodes, JE and DuBois, DL, 2006 ‘Understanding and facilitating the youth mentoring movement’ Social Policy
Report, Vol XX, No 3, p4.

Chapter 4
School-based Mentoring
It takes a whole village to raise a child.
Standing Tall
African proverb

Standing Tall 0
Building relationships between members of
the community and students in schools
Introduction
The fact that schools give young people their best chance to gain the skills and
knowledge needed to develop successful pathways into further education or employment
has led educators to look at interventions which will support their engagement long
enough to take advantage of the opportunities offered. In such a context school-based
mentoring warrants serious attention. In a major study, Karcher (2008) states that
school-based mentoring is the fastest growing form of mentoring in the United States
with fifty percent of the relationships formed in the biggest mentoring agency Big
Brothers/Big Sisters being set up in schools. 1 Herrera et al (2007), in an impact study on
school-based mentoring, states that in 1999 there were 27,000 school-based mentoring
relationships in the United States. and by 2002 it had risen to 90,000 an increase of 233
percent. By 2007 the number had increased to 126,000. 2
Although there has been a rapid increase in school-based mentoring, there is not
the same body of research to show the value of school-based mentoring as, due to
its longer history, most of the mentoring literature has been focused on communitybased
mentoring where mentors spend three to four hours with a young person over
a whole year. School-based mentoring takes place in settings where most mentors
spend one hour with a student and the relationships are limited to the school terms.
The school setting can also limit the length of the time the relationship can continue.
Researchers have been interested in both assessing whether school-based mentoring
can deliver positive outcomes and, if so, identifying what outcomes they should
focus on. As programs take place in institutions where the main focus is academic
outcomes it would be assumed that school grades would be the most obvious area
to look at. However, Karcher et al (2006) believe that psychosocial and academic
outcomes are interrelated and academic performance is relatively distal and a less
immediate outcome of school-based mentoring. They suggest that, in evaluating
programs, it may be wiser to look at such areas as self esteem and connectedness
which are known to be precursors to academic outcomes. 3
Research into school-based mentoring
Two reports Herrera (1999) and Herrera et al (2000) for Public/Private Ventures,
a national research establishment in the United States found that school-based
mentoring may benefit young people both socially and academically and strong
relationships could be formed in a school-based program. 4 The later research
found that over 90 percent of mentors in both community-based and school-based
programs said that they felt ‘close’ to their mentees and a similar proportion stated
that they felt emotionally and instrumentally supportive of the young people with
whom they had mentoring relationships. 5
In 2004 and 2007 Herrera and her colleagues explored the impact of school-based
mentoring in greater depth. The 2004 report focused on 212 Grade 3 to Grade 5

Standing Tall 1
students in three different schools and in the 2007 reports focused on 1139 Grade
4 to Grade 9 students, half of which were in the study and half of which were
in the control group. The 2004 research established that there were changes to
classroom behaviours, social skills and peer relationships, all of which could be
seen as precursors to school engagement, but did not find changes in academic
outcomes. 6 However in the 2007 report she and her colleagues found that by the
end of the first year the students involved in the program had improved in a range
of areas including their academic attitudes, performance and behaviours. In the
area of academic performance the changes were in the areas of science, written
and oral language, quality of class work and number of assignments completed The
improved attitudes and behaviour led to a reduced number of school infractions (ie
visits to the principal, school suspensions etc) and also the students skipped school
less often. 7
A University of Alberta (2004) report on the Partners with Kids school-based
mentoring program at Norwood Primary school in Edmonton Alberta cites
research by Freedman (1996) of 1000 students aged from 10 to 16 in mentoring
programs, which found substantial reductions in absenteeism, violence, improved
school performance and improved relations with friends and family. 8 The report
also cites Lefowitz (1986) who found in a study of over 500 ‘successful’ young
adults from low socioeconomic or educationally disadvantaged backgrounds, that
many respondents attributed their success to the support of an ‘adult who cared’. 9
It would seem that there is a firm research base to indicate the benefits of schoolbased
mentoring but it is important to note that the research has also identified
practices which are important for school-based mentoring to be effective. Du Bois
et al (2002b) for example warns that mentoring programs that are poorly run have
small effects. 10 Effective practices in school-based mentoring.
Match length
Herrera and her colleagues found in the 2004 and 2007 reports that, as in
community-based mentoring programs, the length and quality of the relationship
is the most important factor for the mentoring experience to have an impact.
In their 2007 research they found that even though changes could be detected in
students after 12 months these were not sustained when the relationship did not
continue 11 and they cite other studies which found that short term programs for
youth do not induce long term change. 12
These conclusions reflect similar findings in the area of community-based
mentoring. In his research on school-based mentoring, Karcher (2008) cites
research indicating that programs in which mentors quit prematurely or which only
provide short term mentors (ie six months or shorter) have been associated with
negative outcomes. 13
Quality of relationship
As in community-based mentoring, research has found that the strength of the
bond that is formed between mentor and a young person governs the degree of
impact of their relationship. Herrera et al (2007) found that the students who
experienced more than one school year of very high quality relationships receive
bigger benefits from program participation than students involved in weaker
relationships. 14
Activities
It would be easy for the main focus of mentoring in schools to be academic

Standing Tall 2
outcomes such areas as numeracy and literacy. Some programs, such as Partners for
Kids in Edmonton Alberta, make literacy a priority but the research suggests that
the value of school-based mentoring program lies more in the social interaction.
Herrera, Sipe, and McClanahan (2000) found that social activities were important
in school-based mentoring programs to produce all three measures of a positive
relationship-closeness, emotional and instrumental supportiveness. 15
Herrera et al(2007) found that the focus of the mentoring relationships in
the programs they studied tended to be on non-academic activities, with
most volunteers seeking to ‘be a friend’ or help their student ‘feel good about
themselves’. 16 They cite Morrow and Styles (1995) who found that mentors with
the central goal of changing or improving youth in some way, eg improving their
behaviour or improving grades, to be less successful in building and sustaining
effective relationships than mentors with goals of relationship development. 17
Training
Orientation and training are as important in school-based mentoring programs as
community-based mentoring programs to achieve the relationships which can have
the greatest impact. Herrera, Sipe and McClanahan (2000) found that mentors
who attended less than two hours of prematch orientation reported the lowest
levels of relationship quality whereas those attending six hours of training reported
having strongest relationships with young people. 18
Understanding and working with schools
Schools are complex and there are many different activities and programs
operating in the school environment. Mentoring is but another activity and if the
administration and the teachers are going to support mentoring programs they
need to have a strong understanding of the role mentoring can play in delivering
positive outcomes for young people.
The University of Alberta report concluded:
It was very clear that in order for teachers to perceive the benefits of the
mentorship program to outweigh the detriments they must be provided
support in terms of a communication conduit between themselves,
mentors and mentees. 19
Every school has its own distinct culture and bureaucracy and each school will
react to the possibility of mentoring in a different way. Herrera (2007) found it
important that program staff related well to students but also understood what
school personnel needed in order to trust and support the program and that Big
Brothers, Big Sisters of America recommends that school-based programs make
efforts to hire staff that have some experience with schools. 20 She cites Hansen
(2002) who showed that school-based mentoring programs with closer ties to their
schools reported fewer premature match closings and longer average match lengths
than programs that had less interaction with affiliated schools. 21
Support for mentor
One of the key factors in creating strong long lasting mentoring relationships is
support for mentors. Herrera (2004) found the importance of agency support for
mentors an important factor in the success of school-based mentoring programs.
She found mentors who perceived receiving more support reported closer and more
positive relationships. 22 The University of Alberta report suggested the importance
of monthly support meetings. It also pointed out that mentors needed to know
school policies. 23

Standing Tall
Feedback in the Inspire mentoring program run by Flinders University in Adelaide
found that schools that had good communication and support for mentors had a
much higher retention rate of mentors (some returning for three years) but schools
lacking good communication with their mentors do not retain their mentors. This
was despite mentors who left the program early reporting the support from Inspire
project staff was excellent. 24
Mentor programs
Dr Susan Weinberger, pioneer in designing and developing school-based
mentoring programs in the United States and founder of the Norwalk Mentor
Program, has concluded that the keys to program effectiveness are:
• strong agency capacity
• proven program design
• effective community partnerships
• sustainable resource development
• useful program evaluation. 25
In a keynote address delivered to a conference on school bases mentoring
in Missouri 2003 Weinberger imparted some of the lessons she has learned
concerning school-based mentoring in the 10 years that she had been involved:
• Youth experience negative feelings about themselves, poor relationships
with family members, poor grades mixing with the wrong crowd, loneliness,
isolation, lack of moral development, peer pressure, substance abuse,
depression, obesity, lack of positive role models and bullying.
• Labelling youth ‘at risk’, labels them in the media and for life. Call mentees
youth ‘at the brink of success’.
• Schools need to be equal partners with mentoring programs and to provide
financial support space, telephones, materials and flexible scheduling.
• Youth in schools who need mentors are not just from minority groups or poor
one parent they are also from two parent middle class families.
• Teachers must learn about the mentoring BEFORE the public in order to feel
empowered to deliver the program.
• The best way to identity youth for a program is to ask teachers for
recommendations.
• Mentors who are offered support and supervision are more likely to persist
than those who are not contacted regularly.
• Social workers have reported that their case loads have been reduced and
nurses have noted a reduction in visits from students with mentors.
• Parents, teachers, mentors and mentees all benefit from mentoring.
• Mentoring works. 26

Standing Tall
Conclusion
Endnotes
As schools explore proactive ways to create supportive environments for young
people research shows that there is potential value in engaging members of the
community through school-based mentoring. However, the literature also shows
that mentoring programs must be based on best practice supported by the school
and have a good understanding of school culture to reach their potential.
1. Karcher,,M, 2008, ‘The study of mentoring in the Learning Environment(SMILE).A Randomized Evaluation of the
Effectiveness of School-based Mentoring’. The Prevention Science.
2. Herrera, C et al, 2007, Making a Difference in Schools: The Big Brothers Big Sisters School-Based Mentoring Impact Study,
Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia, United States, Executive Summary i.
3. Karcher, M, 2008, ‘The study of mentoring in the Learning Environment(SMILE).A Randomized Evaluation of the
Effectiveness of School-based Mentoring’. The Prevention Science.
4. Herrera, C, 2004, School-Based Mentoring: A Closer Look, Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia, United States,.p23.
5. Herrera, C, Sipe, CL, and McClanahan, W, 2000, Mentoring school-age children: Relationship development in communitybased
and school-based programs, Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia, United States, p9.
6. Herrera, C, 2004, School-Based Mentoring: A Closer Look, Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia, United States, pp26 27.
7. Herrera, C et al, 2007, Making a Difference in Schools: The Big Brothers Big Sisters School-Based Mentoring Impact Study,
Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia, United States, Executive Summary, iv.
8. University of Alberta, Research and Development Group, School-Based Mentorship. Programs Supporting Children
and Youth, p2.
9. Ibid.
10. Herrera, C, 2004, School-Based Mentoring: A Closer Look, Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia, United States, pp2 3.
11. Herrera, C et al, 2007, Making a Difference in Schools: The Big Brothers Big Sisters School-Based Mentoring Impact Study,
Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia, United States.
12. Herrera, C et al, 2007, Making a Difference in Schools: The Big Brothers Big Sisters School-Based Mentoring Impact Study,
Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia, United States. Studies cited by Walker and Villela-Villez (1992); Aseltine,
Dupre and Lamlein, (2000).
13. Karcher, M, 2008 ‘The study of mentonrig in the Learning Environment(SMILE).A Randomized Evaluation of the
Effectiveness of School-based Mentoring’. The Prevention Science, Studies cited are Grossman and Rhodes (2002);
Karcher (2005); Rhodes et al (2000).
14. Herrera, C et al, 2007, Making a Difference in Schools: The Big Brothers Big Sisters School-Based Mentoring Impact Study,
Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia, United States, p70.
15. Herrera, C, Sipe, CL and McClanahan, W, 2000, Mentoring school-age children: Relationship development in communitybased
and school-based programs, Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia, United States, p8.
16. Herrera, C et al, 2007, Making a Difference in Schools: The Big Brothers Big Sisters School-Based Mentoring Impact Study,
Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia, United States, p23.
17. Ibid, p 70.
18. Herrera, C, Sipe, CL and McClanahan, W, 2000, Mentoring school-age children: Relationship development in communitybased
and school-based programs, Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia, United States, p8.
19. University of Alberta, Research and Development Group, School-Based Mentorship. Programs Supporting Children
and Youth, p9.
20. Herrera, C, 1999, School-based mentoring: A first look into its potential, Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia, United
States, p8.
21. Herrera, C, 2004, School-Based Mentoring: A Closer Look, Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia, United States, pp2 3.
22. Ibid, p26.

Standing Tall
23. University of Alberta, Research and Development Group, School-Based Mentorship. Programs Supporting Children
and Youth, p26.
24. Koerner, C and Harris, J, ‘Inspired learning: Creating engaged teaching and learning environments for university and
school students through university to school mentoring programs’ International Education Journal, 2007, 8(2) pp354 364.
25. Weinberger, S, 2005, Presentation at Rhode Island Mentoring Conference.
26. Weinberger, S, 2005, Keynote address, School based Mentoring Conference, Kansas City, Missouri, October 14, 2003.

Standing Tall
Chapter 5
Standing Tall School-based
mentoring program
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful
committed citizens can change the world.
Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.
Margaret Mead

A school and community working together
Background
Standing Tall
In 2003 the idea of a mentoring program was presented to a number of
professionals working with young people including teachers, welfare coordinators,
psychologists and social workers in Hamilton, a rural city of 10,000, situated in
Western Victoria. They all agreed that the possibility of setting up relationships
between caring members of the community and a number of the young people they
worked with would be of great value.
The belief was that mentoring in a school setting could be of benefit because:
• school provides the greatest opportunity for a young person to access
education and gain the skills and knowledge to lead fulfilling lives
• all young people attend school, so mentoring could be introduced as a
protective intervention before students disengaged from school at later stage
• many students work below their potential because social and emotional issues
impinge impinge on their ability or willingness to focus on their school work .
These students could benefit from the support and encouragement of a caring
adult at a level which cannot be offered by teachers
• there would be value inherent to the school and the community working in
partnership
• teachers and mentors could work together in identifying how a young person
could be supported
• intergenerational links could be forged of mutual benefit to both students
and older members of the community. The older members of the community
could experience the feeling of making a difference and being valued whereas
students feel a sense of being connected to the broader community
• resources already available in a school could be accessed by the mentoring
program.
It was decided that the program should be established at Baimbridge College
in Hamilton a co-educational Prep to Year12 school with an enrolment of
approximately 800 students. The College and its feeder schools are government
schools that service the city and the surrounding district. Research has shown
that students in rural settings are at risk in a number of areas. In September 2004
a ‘Youth Issues Report’, published by the Southern Grampians Primary Health
Care Partnership, focused on some of the important issues affecting young people
in the region. It stated that the retention rate of students in the Barwon South
West Region, which encompasses Hamilton, is 70.8 percent compared to the
State average of 81.2 percent. Socio-economic factors would appear to strongly
influence these statistics eg 44 percent of students at Baimbridge College are on
the Educational Maintenance Allowance.
The Standing Tall Implementation Committee, consisting of members from both
the school and the community, was formed. The committee applied to the Local
Learning and Education Network (LLEN) for funds to employ a coordinator to
implement a pilot program. As the LLEN focuses on post compulsory schooling,
Year 11 students were targeted for the pilot program.

Standing Tall
In 2004, Glenelg and Southern Grampians Primary Care Youth Issues Report
Partnership made the following observation:
Setting up the program
Early intervention is crucial. Improvements to social connectedness
and personal skills in school years 6 and 7 have been shown to improve
resilience and to reduce the proportion of children who continue to
engage in anti-social behaviour. Addressing problems before they become
entrenched is a key strategy in intervening in young people’s lives. 1
This observation was supported by teachers in the school and in the second year
of the program, due to a generous donation by Geoff and Helen Handbury, the
program was expanded to other years in the College and in 2006 the program
expanded to feeder primary schools within the city of Hamilton.
A number of underlying principles underlying the program have developed:
1) The value of mentoring comes through the length and quality of the
mentoring relationship. Relationships take time to develop and have different
stages. Mentors are asked to commit to the program for twelve months.
2) Mentoring can be a powerful intervention at any stage in the life of a young
person but the earlier the relationship can be established the greater the
benefit for the young person.
3) Engaging members of the community to become mentors to young people is a
community building tool which enriches the whole community not just the
young person.
4) The relationships in the program have no other agenda other than the
support of a young person in reaching their potential.
5) Educational outcomes are inextricably linked to the social and emotional
well-being of young people.
The College Council was approached to take responsibility for the program and
after approval was given the Committee of Management of the Standing Tall
program became responsible to the Council. It has aimed to establish the program
based on research into best practice. The first coordinator of the program was
Louise Yole. Jeanette Pritchard who was the teacher liaison of the program at the
time was awarded a Westfield Premier’s Education Scholarship which enabled her
to travel to North America and gain insight from leading practitioners, educators
and researchers involved in mentoring in both the United States and Canada.
Learning acquired through this experience was incorporated into the program. In
addition, the importance of the sentiments expressed by Geraldine Doogue in the
following statement is not to be underestimated:
You come up with this great idea but in fact the challenge is not to do
it once but to repeat it and to be well enough organised to be able to
persuade others in the community it is repeatable. Anything that’s an
amazing one-off event hasn’t achieved a lot. The real magic is in the
durability. 2

Standing Tall
The objective was to develop a structure and processes sufficiently effective and
convincing to attract funding and to be sustainable. The different aspects of the
program are captured on the following model.
Marketing
Effective
Efficient
School
Ownership
Understanding
Support
School ownership
Mentoring program
Strong vision
Strong rationale
Strong sense of ownership by
school and community
Clear processes
A community
supporting young
people
Funding
Identification of possible sources
Community
Partnerships
Ownerships
Evaluation
Identification of impact of program
Continual review and improvement
of program
In setting up the program it was important to have an understanding of the
established Department of Education regional structures and personnel focused on
the well-being of students.
The Bawon South Western region of the Department of Education has a Student
Well-Being Unit with a manager and a number of project co-coordinators
responsible for different aspects of the well-being of students. It has School
Support Services with professionals available to assess and support students with
serious problems. Baimbridge College has a Welfare Coordinator responsible for
dealing with issues impinging on the well-being of students at the College. She
chairs the Well-being Committee of the College which consists of members of
the school Administration and Year Level Coordinatorsas well as implementing a
number of programs focused on the well-being of students. The Coordinator also
liaises with external personnel in the Welfare area.
A coordinator administers the Middle School which has been established to give
Year 5-7 students a strong sense of connection with the College.
The Standing Tall program endeavoured to gain the support of all the personnel
focused on the well-being of students.

Standing Tall 0
Community engagement
The program also worked hard to establish a sense of community ownership as it
was aware that community involvement was intrinsic to its success
It endeavoured to inform the community of the rationale and vision of the program:
• through the media
• presentations at local community groups
• developing connections and partnerships with community groups
• presentations at forums and conferences.
The community has acknowledged the program with a number of awards. These were:
• 2006 An Australia Day Community Recognition award to Jeanette
Pritchard now the coordinator of the program
• 2006 The Community Enterprise Award at the local Powercorp Business
Awards
• 2006 Finalist in the Victorian Regional Achievement Award in the category
of Community Award-over 500 population
• 2007 Finalist in the South Coast Business Awards
• 2008 A Pride of Workmanship award to one of the mentors awarded by a
local Rotary Club.
In 2007 the Mayor and the Shire of Southern Grampians Shire hosted a
celebration during Youth Mentoring Week to recognise the contribution made by
members and supporters of the program.
Examples of Community partnerships and
other developments in the community
Partnership with Iluka mining Resources
Iluka Resources is a Western Australia based mining company. Stakeholder
engagement is an integral part of the company’s business as it allows the
organisation to understand and address the expectations of the communities it
operates within. This commitment is taken seriously and community relations
personnel are located in each location where Iluka operates.
Illuka and the Standing Tall program reached a partnership agreement both
sharing a common goal of developing opportunities for young people. The business
allows time release for employees interested in becoming mentors in order to take
part in training sessions and attend weekly mentoring sessions with their students.
Standing Tall ensures Iluka is acknowledged in all published materials, such as
annual reports.

According to the agreement formed Standing Tall gives:
• expression of interest packs to interested employees
• recruitment procedures for interested employees
• training for prospective mentors
• matching session for mentors and students
• support for the mentoring relationship.
Iluka gives:
Standing Tall 1
• discussion time with coordinators of Standing Tall program
• time for employees to attend information session
• time release to interested employees for interview, training and weekly
mentoring sessions
Partnership with Community Police
In 2007 the local Community Policeman took 10 boys from the College who
identified as being of risk of disengaging from school, from school on the police
High Challenge Camp situated in the Yarra Valley. He was accompanied by
teachers from Baimbridge College, mentors from the Standing Tall mentoring
program and fellow police officers.
Feedback from the camp was very positive with mentors, teachers and police all
reporting changes in both behaviour and attitudes of the boys.
All the boys who attended the camp were offered a mentor in the Standing Tall
program to help maintain and thereby support these changes in the students. The
Community Policeman became a mentor, raising his profile in the school and an
understanding of the positive influence that police can have.
MENTA (Men mentoring men)
The focus of the program on connection and setting up relationships has led to
other unexpected developments in the community. One has been the establishment
of a men’s group, MENTA a social network group of the male mentors in the
program. The men identified that, while women are generally good at developing
strong friendship networks, many men are not able to develop the same networks
outside of their work or family. This often leads to a sense of isolation in their
work, sport and home thus making them vulnerable.
The group, which makes a real effort to be inclusive, has provided a safe and
enjoyable environment for men from varied backgrounds to meet together and
explore topics which are meaningful to them. It meets on a regular basis usually
sharing a meal and engaging in a wide range of enjoyable activities. The group has
also been aware of boys in the program who benefit from having connection with a
group of men and have taken the boys on a bush walking excursion.

Standing Tall 2
The students
The mentors
Relationships in the program have been set up with students from Grade 3 to Year
12. At the beginning of the program a lot of effort was made to establish a strong
sense of ownership by the students. Focus groups were established with Year 9,
10 and 11 students to ascertain their interest in such a program. The students
indicated that:
• setting up relationships with caring adults could be of great value
• students should volunteer to be in the program
• Year 9 and 10 students could benefit most
• mentor and student should be matched according to preference
• matching activities should be fun
• trust between mentor and student would need to be built
• the age and sex of the mentor would not matter
• mentors would need to be good listeners, be understanding, supportive, nonjudgmental,
have a sense of humour and like young people.
In the Pilot Program an information session explaining the role that mentoring
could play was given to the Year 10 students and they were asked to self refer if
they felt mentoring could be of benefit. A number of students self referred. Their
enthusiasm led to the program being received positively by the general student
body. As the program developed most of the students were referred by teachers,
support staff and parents although students were still able to self refer. Reasons for
referral range from a lack of confidence, a lack of social skills, poor motivation and
social isolation. All referrals are checked by the Welfare teacher to see if there are
other interventions in place or whether problems confronted by the student warrant
professional support rather than what can be offered in the mentoring program.
Students sign a statement regarding their willingness to be in the program and
parental permission is sought.
Mentors in the program have come from all walks of life and are a cross section
of the community. They include from professionals, business people, retirees and
teachers or other personnel within the school.

Mentor room
Activities
Processes developed in the
implementation of the program
Standing Tall
The College has allowed the mentoring program to operate in two classrooms no
longer in use. Renovations of the rooms have been carried out by mentor working
bees. Resources for the rooms have been donated by businesses and members of the
community.
Students and mentors have participated in a wide range of activities, eg working on
joint projects, sharing meals, , playing games, doorknocking for community causes,
exploring workplaces and being involved in other community activities. Mentors
have also given academic support if the student feels that they could benefit. There
has been mutual learning as the mentors and the young people share skills and life
experiences.
The planning and development of Standing Tall has been based on the Benchmarks
put forward by Mentoring Australia.
Statement of Purpose
The stated purpose of the Standing Tall program is the recruitment and training
of members of the community to support young people in a school setting to fulfil
their potential.
Policy and procedures
As the program is embedded within Baimbridge College, the Committee of
Management is seen as a subcommittee of the Baimbridge College School Council.
Mentors have the same accountability as other personnel working in the school
system.
A Policy Manual has been prepared for the mentors which contains the policies
of Baimbridge College that relate to student welfare and other personnel policies
seen as being pertinent to mentoring eg meetings outside the program, parental
permission, disclosure, no touching, no smoking, child protection legislation,
general policy, insurance, confidentiality, grievance resolution, get out clause and
privacy.

Standing Tall
The Manual also contains an outline of their rights as volunteers, a Mentor Code of
Ethics and a Mentoring Agreement. It has been passed by the School Council and
a community legal representative on the Committee.
Recruitment and selection process
The program uses a wide range of methods to recruit mentors including the
publication of brochures, articles in a range of media and presentations at a wide
range of community organisations.
Community members showing interest are sent an Information Pack including an
Expression of Interest which they return to the program if they are interested in
becoming a mentor. An application form is sent on the receipt of this Expression
of Interest and, if returned, the process of screening begins. The program looks for
community members who are willing to be committed and have the appropriate
skills and attitudes to work with young people. This is identified through an
interview. Successful applicants are invited to a mentor training session. All
prospective mentors must have a Working with Children Check and a Continuous
Screening Process has been developed to ensure that the program has appropriate
individuals in the program,
Mentor training
It is considered important that mentors have a good understanding of the program,
the role expected of them and of how a mentoring relationship can be developed.
To facilitate this the mentors are given good preparation through training.
This Standing Tall training takes approximately nine hours. It respects the life
experience and high level of communication skills already demonstrated by the
mentors.
Areas covered in the training are:
• the rationale for mentoring
• the history of mentoring
• understanding of the Standing Tall program
• adolescent development
• understanding of the role and qualities of an effective mentor
• communication skills
• values
• policies
• how to establish a relationship
• the mentoring journey.
The training has accommodated new understandings as the program has evolved.
Matching activities
The focus of mentoring is a relationship between students and mentors. The
program, when possible, sets up a matching session where mentors and students are
involved in a number of activities allowing students and mentors to interact and get
to know each other. At the end of the session mentors and students give preferences
regarding the mentoring relationships. As three preferences are expressed matches
can usually be made and if not the Coordinator discusses this with the student. If

Standing Tall
mentors are unable to attend the session the Coordinator makes the match based
on shared interests or other factors which would indicate suitability.
Monitoring the relationship
An important component of the program is monitoring is the day to day running of
the program. Both students and mentors lose faith in the integrity of the program
if they come for a session and there is an absence which they have not been
informed about.
Monitoring relationships is important and a Sign in/Sign out book is used for
communication allowing mentors to give feedback regarding any issues that have
arisen.
Mentor support
The program is very aware of the need for mentors to feel supported in their
commitment to the mentoring relationship. Establishing a relationship with
a young person can take time and patience and mentors need encouragement.
Mentors are aware of the different stages of a mentoring relationship but
sometimes they need support to get though the more difficult initial stages. The
program organises a number of mentor support meeting throughout the year. Some
have a training component but at other times the mentor support through a social
event. Mentors find sharing their experiences of tremendous value and enjoyment.
The College also welcomes mentors at staff morning teas at the end of term to
demonstrate its appreciation of their contribution.
Participation in the program is marked with a certificate which is given to both
mentors and students who have maintained the relationship over 12 months.
Closure policy
The program has developed a closure policy. Letters to mentors, students and
parents are sent when a relationship is terminated to identify the program is no
longer supporting the relationship.
Different forms of mentoring
The Standing Tall program has experimented with different forms of mentoring.
Group mentoring
In 2005 it set up a trial group mentoring program for a group of Year 8 boys.
The boys met once weekly on a lunch time over a term and a wide range of pursuits
offered including activities in the gym, the drama room and the mentoring room.
The program culminated in an abseiling trip in the Grampians.

Standing Tall
Replication
Conclusion
Endnotes
Peer mentoring
At the end of 2005 a group of Year 9 students were trained as peer mentors for
Grade 5 students in the following year. The students met with their students and it
proved a valuable experience for both groups.
As the peer mentors moved into Year 11 they found their workloads and other
commitments did not allow them to give the time required to keep the mentoring
going but the relationships continued on an informal basis.
The Standing Tall Program has attracted interest in other schools in the South
West Region and has developed an Implementation Manual and Training Manual
for the purpose of replication. The program has been replicated at the Secondary
College in Camperdown, another town in Western Victoria.
The program, now in its fourth year, has been responsible for training 101 mentors
supporting mentoring relationships for 135 students from Grade 4 to Year 12.
The Standing Tall program has emerged as an early intervention school-based
mentoring program which aims, through the establishment of mentoring
relationships between members of the community and students in a school setting,
to strengthen the resilience of the young people and heighten their engagement
with school.
1. Gannon, K, 2004, Youth Issues Report, Southern Grampians and Glenelg Primary Care Partnership, Victoria.
2. Doogue, G, 2005, ‘Imagine - Communities with Vibrant Hearts and Souls’, Communities in Control Conference Our
Community and Centacare Catholic Family Services.

Standing Tall
Chapter 6
Evaluation of the Standing
Tall program
Kids can walk around trouble if there is some
place to walk to and someone to walk with.
UnitedWay of Laramie County
Ireland

Standing Tall
Methodology
Baimbridge College, as with all schools, faces the challenge of disengagement
of some of its students. A belief that one-to-one relationships with caring
adults fosters well-being in young people, thus enhancing the likelihood of
their engagement in the school setting was the underlying rationale for the
establishment of the Standing Tall school-based mentoring program.
Evaluation of the program focused on assessing the effectiveness of the Standing
Tall model of mentoring to establish relationships of value and the identification of
any changes in behaviours and attitudes of the participants in the program.
It focused on:
• the ability of the program to establish close relationships between members of
the community and students within a school setting
• the identification of any positive personal or school related outcomes
for young people as observed by the young people themselves and the
observations of the mentors and the teachers
• the contribution of the key elements of the program
• the need to modify or improve the any aspects of the program
• the benefits to the school the mentors and the wider community.
It is important to note that:
• the evaluation took place with a group of boys, most of whom are in Year 7
to 10. The students had been referred to the program because they were seen
as being at risk of not taking full advantage of what is offered in school and
disengaging from school.
• evaluating the outcomes was a complex task as students enter the program
with a variety of needs.
• mentoring is only one of many influences in the life of the young people
Surveys
Evaluation was undertaken by the use of surveys, focus groups. interviews and
feedback
Two surveys were used in the evaluation of the program.
The first survey (Survey A) was given to both the students and mentors, who had
established relationships over six months aimed to explore:
• their perception of the quality of the mentoring relationship
• changes in the student ( as perceived by the student and observed by the
mentor), and changes in the student’s attitude towards school (as perceived by
the student and observed by the mentor).

The sample
Standing Tall
The second survey (Survey B) was given to mentors and teachers at the beginning
of the relationship and then at regular intervals. The surveys were aimed at seeing
if the mentors and the teachers observed any shift in behaviours and attitudes of
students involved in the mentoring program eg a student becoming more cooperative,
confident motivated and taking greater responsibility for their actions.
The program believed that such shifts in would enhance the likelihood of the
young person engaging with their education. (Note: Explanation of the survey is
given in Chapter 2). Results for the evaluation were only collated for students who
had been in the program over ten months as little change was observed by teachers
before that time.
Focus groups
Focus groups were conducted with the mentors to gain a greater understanding
how they developed the mentoring relationships, indicators of trust in the
relationships developing, challenges faced, the perceived benefits of being involved
in the program and an assessment of the support they received from the program.
Interviews and feedback
Interviews were conducted with the Welfare Coordinator, the Middle School
Coordinator, a Senior Student Well-being/Drug Educator for the Barwon South
West Region of the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development
and a class room teacher, all of whom have different responsibilities for students
within the school environment. They were asked to identify what they saw as the
main reasons for the disengagement of young people, pressures on teachers and
the contribution of the mentoring program to the school. Interviews were also
conducted with students in the program. Feedback was sought from the Principal,
other personnel working with young people in the community and the ambassador
for the program, the local Uniting Church minister. Feedback was also sought
from other schools in the region.
Although the program was supporting 41 relationships, the evaluation focused on
the relationships which had been established over 6 months It is important to note
that all the relationships which were evaluated were with boys ranging from Grade
4 to Year 11. Nineteen boys and one girl had been in the program been in program
over 6 months. The mentor of the girl was on long service leave thus the data in the
findings relates only to boys.
Table 1: Year levels of the students in sample for evaluation
Year level Grade 4 Grade 6 Year 7 Year 8 Year 9 Year 10 Year 11
No of students 1 3 2 3 7 2 1
There were 8 male mentors and 11 female mentors

Standing Tall 0
Findings
The school context
The College works on the premise that students believe in the value of education
and have a sense of connection to the College. However the experience has
indicated there are students who display attitudes and behaviour suggesting that
this is not the case.
The Middle School Coordinator and the Regional Student Well-being/Drug
Educator identified the following reasons for disengagement:
• family background where education is not valued resulting in a lack of
support for students
• students unable to see the relevance of the curriculum leading to a lack of
motivation
• lack of basic skills in literacy and numeracy
• a sense of being unconnected to peers and the school
• a sense of not being valued by their peer group teachers or the school
structure.
The Regional Student Well-being/Drug Educator Coordinator wondered
whether the discipline/behaviour management at the College, involving time
outs, detentions and suspensions, could be a contributing factor in disengagement
however the classroom teacher saw peer pressure as the key factor in moulding
behaviours and attitudes of students in a classroom setting.
The Welfare Coordinator had a deeper understanding and knowledge of the many
challenges faced by young people which impact on their engagement with school.
These included:
• parents with substance abuse and mental health issues
• difficult home situations due such things as family break ups or domestic
violence
• welfare dependent parents
• established reputations because of past behaviours and attitudes.
She identified that some of these situations lead to intense anger which is displaced
onto the relationships in the school environment.
Behaviours and attitudes which indicate disengagement are:
• poor attention in the classroom
• non completion of set tasks both at school and at home
• disruptive behaviour in the classroom and the school environment
• destructive acts in a school system eg destroying to defacing property
• defiance of authority
• aggressive behaviour towards others.

Standing Tall 1
The welfare structure at the College is strong and teachers work hard to provide a
supportive environment for the students. However school personnel interviewed
identified pressures on teachers at the College which can limit the time that they
have to support individual students. These include:
• the growth of behavioural issues which leads to teachers needing to develop
new skills and find a balance between empathy for students and classroom
management
• increased face to face time expected of teachers
• more complex internal and external assessment required of students
• the development of relevant and engaging curriculum
• the need to deal with a wide range of parents
• the expansion of the roles expected of teachers.
Quality of the mentoring relationships
The Standing Tall program has been clear that the focus of the relationships is
trust. Once the trust has been developed the mentor and the students can explore
ways to enable the student to identify their goals and then move towards them.
In the surveys and focus groups the mentors stated that they understood their role
with most believing that trust had been built up in their relationship with a young
person.
The students responded positively to questions concerning the quality of the
relationship:
• all believed they are liked by their mentor
• most believed their mentor respected them
• all stated that their mentor listened to them and accepted them as they are
• most stated that their mentors saw their strengths and encouraged them
• most said that they appreciated having an adult friend.
The strength of the relationships, as indicated in the surveys, was reinforced by the
discussions in the mentor focus groups. The mentors demonstrated a willingness to
be non-judgemental, flexible and patient with their students. Some mentors were
aware of the challenges their students faced but were also aware of the strengths
and the resilience the student showed.
Practices of value
In the development of a trusting relationship different mentors identified the
following practices to be of value:
• willingness to show a genuine interest in a young person
• willingness to just listen
• willingness to be non judgmental and display real friendship
• planning and sharing of joint projects and activities
• shared enjoyment of playing games such as table tennis, ice-hockey or pool
• sharing lunch together
• excursions outside the school to different settings allowing the students to relax

Standing Tall 2
• finding things in common.
Mentors were also able to point towards breakthroughs in the relationships which
they saw as indicators of trust developing These included students becoming more
relaxed, being more open about their concerns and making eye contact.
Building a trusting relationship
Toby referred himself. He was a boy who had a lot of trouble relating to other
students and he was not trusting of adults, all of which isolated him. After 12
months the mentor stated:
He has grown into his self worth and his aims and goals are good.
In his relationship with me he is confident, self disciplined and very
friendly. He does not relate well to others but his trust is building
with me. He is starting to ask me questions
Toby’s mother stated:
He trusts his mentor and will talk to him about the future in a way
that he will not with me.
Table 2: Student’s perception of the characteristics of the mentoring relationship
(in relationships over 6 months), % of respondents, n=19
Strongly
agree
Agree
Don’t
know
Disagree
Strongly
disagree
Agree
(agree and
strongly
agree)
My mentor likes me 74% 26% 100%
My mentor respects me 63% 32% 95%
My mentor is interested in me 68% 26% 5% 100%
My mentor accepts me as I am 84% 16% 100%
My mentor listens to me 84% 16% 84%
My mentor knows what I am good
at and encourages me.
58% 26% 16% 95%
It is good having an adult as a friend 68% 26% 5% 100%
I respect my mentor 89% 11% 89%
I feel safe to talk to my mentor 68% 21% 11%
Sometimes my mentor makes me
think about things differently
My mentor and I decide what to do
together
My mentor has helped me see
that I am good at things and has
encouraged me
37% 32% 21% 69%
63% 26% 11% 89%
68% 26% 5% 94%

Outcomes of surveys
Survey A
Standing Tall
Table 3: Mentor’s perception of the characteristics of the mentoring relationship (in
relationships over 6 months), % of respondents, n=19
Strongly
agree
In Survey A most mentors stated that they believed the students’ confidence had
grown with a large percentage of students agreeing. Almost three -quarters of
the students stated they felt more comfortable talking to adults with a majority
of mentors agreeing. A big difference between mentors and students came when
asked about relationships with peers and family. Almost three -quarters of students
stated they got along better along with friends and families but most mentors were
not aware of this.
Building confidence
Agree
Don’t
know
Disagree
Strongly
disagree
Leigh was referred to the program because he lacked confidence. He appeared
anxious and not willing to take risks. His mentor is a football coach. Leigh lives
out of town and does not play sport. The match has been successful because the
two were able to share their different worlds. Leigh’s family situation is complex
and when asked about his father he says ‘which father’ In an interview Leigh
stated how much he appreciated having his mentor to talk because in his family
situation he did not feel valued.
After 12 months his mentor stated Leigh has grown in confidence. After
starting the program Leigh gained from the knowledge that others are
interested in him and will take time with him.
Agree
(agree and
strongly
agree)
I understand my role as a mentor 53% 47% 100%
I like my student 89% 11% 100%
I respect my student 79% 21% 100%
I am interested in my student 89% 11% 100%
I listen to my student 79% 21% 100%
My student seems to appreciate
having an adult as a friend
74% 26% 100%
I feel respected by my student 68% 26% 5% 95%
My student seems to feel safe to
talk to me
I have seen my student learn to
trust me over time.
I sometimes try to help my student
to think about things differently
I have seen that my student has
strengths and I have tried to
encourage him/her
My student and I decide what to do
together
53% 42% 5% 95%
42% 53% 5% 95%
42% 58% 100%
37% 58% 5% 95%
37% 63% 100%

Standing Tall
Building self esteem
Jason was referred to the program in Grade 2. His teacher identified that he had
very low self esteem and was constantly seeking attention. He displayed a lot
of anger. After 12 months in the mentoring program the teacher observed that
he had more respect for others and took greater responsibility for his actions,
was more motivated, organised and independent and more settled in class. He
seemed to be getting along better with his peers. She noted that he very much
looked forward to seeing his mentor.
Table 4: Student’s perception of the self change since beginning
(in relationships of 6 months or more), % of respondents,n=19
Since starting mentoring I have
felt more confident
Since starting mentoring I have
been more comfortable to talk to
adults
Since starting mentoring I get along
better with my friends
Since starting mentoring I get along
better with my family
Strongly
agree
Agree
School related outcomes
Don’t
know
Disagree
Strongly
disagree
Agree
(agree and
strongly
agree)
68% 21% 11% 89%
47% 26% 21% 5% 73%
47% 26% 16% 11% 73%
37% 32% 16% 16% 69%
Table 5: Mentor’s perception of the change in students
(in relationships of 6 months or more), % of respondents, n=19
Since starting mentoring my
student seems more confident.
Since starting mentoring my
student seems to be more
comfortable ttalking to adults
Since starting mentoring my
student seems to get along better
with his/her friends
Since starting mentoring my
student seems to get along better
with his/her family
Strongly
agree
Agree
Don’t
know
Disagree
Strongly
disagree
Agree
(agree and
strongly
agree)
58% 37% 5% 95%
26% 42% 32% 68%
26% 5% 68% 30%
11% 16% 68% 27%
In relation to attitudes towards school, the mentors were very positive about the
changes they saw in the students with most stating they believed that there was an
the student had an improved attitude towards school, with nearly three-quarters
of students affirming this. Another result of interest was a large percentage of
students stating that they had started thinking about the future. This focus could
be of great value for a young person seeing the relevance of school to future
aspirations. Another result of interest was that nearly three-quarters of the
students stated that they believe that the school cared about them suggesting a
sense of connection with the school.

Table 6: Student’s attitude to school and future
(in relationships of 6 months or more), % of respondents, n=19
Since starting mentoring I have
changed my attitude to school
Since starting mentoring I try
harder with my school work
My mentor and I talk about the
future
Since starting mentoring I think
more about the future and what I
want to do
Strongly
agree
Agree
Don’t
know
Disagree
Standing Tall
Strongly
disagree
Agree
(agree and
strongly
agree)
32% 42% 11% 16% 74%
26% 37% 16% 5% 16% 63%
53% 16% 16% 5% 11% 69%
53% 32% 11% 5% 85%
This school cares about me 53% 21% 21% 5% 74%
Table 7: Mentor’s perception of student’s attitude to school and the future
(in relationships of 6 months or more), % of respondents, n=19
Since starting mentoring my
student seems to be more
positive about school
Since starting mentoring my
student seems to try harder with
his/her school work
Since starting mentoring my student
seems to be thinking more about the
future he /she wants to do
Survey B
Strongly
agree
Agree
Don’t
know
Disagree
Strongly
disagree
Agree
(agree and
strongly
agree)
32% 58% 5% 95%
21% 47% 26% 68%
53% 21% 21% 74%
The results of survey B related to students who had been in the program over ten
months as the data collected for students who had been in the program for only six
months did not show significant shifts in behaviours and attitudes as observed by
the teachers.
The results showed that both mentors and teachers observed shifts towards more
positive behaviours and attitudes in students.
Figure 1
In the area of positive attributes teachers observed shifts in all areas but they saw
the greatest shifts in the area of belonging and mastery which would indicate
teachers observed students in the program showing shifts in behaviour and
attitudes which could demonstrate a greater sense of wanting to be involved,
feeling valued and connected in the school setting and a willingness to make a
greater effort with their school work.

Standing Tall
Behaviours and attitudes which show positive attributes
BELONGING
Attached
Friendly
Gregarious
Co-operative
Trusting
Figure 2
MASTERY
Achiever
Successful
Creative
Problem-solver
Motivated
Persistent
INDEPENDENCE
Autonomous
Confident
Assertive
Takes responsibility
Inner control
Self discipline
Leadership
GENEROSITY
Altruistic
Caring
Sharing
Loyal
Empathetic
Pro-social
Supportive
In the area of positive attitudes mentors also saw shifts in all areas particularly in
the area of belonging and connectedness. However the mentors also saw shifts in
the areas of independence and generosity which could indicate students feeling a
stronger sense of control in their lives and preparedness to move towards making
positive and responsible choices and developing a more caring attitude towards
others. The fact that these observations take place in the context of a caring one-toone
relationship with a caring adult could indicate the value of such a relationship.
Percentage
Figure 2: Mentor observed changes in positive behaviours and attitudes
(after 10-month relationships), n=12
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Survey response - Mentor - Observed positive attributes
Belonging Mastery Independence Generosity
Attributes
Before mentoring
After 10 months plus mentoring

Standing Tall
Behaviours and attitudes which show distorted attributes
BELONGING
Dependant on
peer approval
Craves acceptance
Overly dependant
Attention seeking
Figure 3
MASTERY
Overachievement
Risk seeker
Arrogant
Cheater
INDEPENDENCE
Dictatorial
Reckless/macho
Bullies others
Manipulative
Rebellious
Defiant of authority
GENEROSITY
Over involved with
others concerns
Playing martyr
Co dependant
Dependent on the
approval of others
In the area of distorted behaviours teachers observed a rise in challenging
behaviours in the area of belonging and independence. A possible explanation for
this could be that students in the program, who had experienced a rise in selfconfidence,
had sought to gain peer approval thought authority defying behaviour
and attention seeking behaviour in the classroom.
Figure 4
In contrast, in the area of distorted attributes revealed by challenging behaviours,
mentors saw the students displaying distorted attitudes in all areas at the beginning
of the relationship and a drop in these as the mentoring relationship developed.
Of particular significance is the drop in the area of distorted attributes in the
area of belonging where students would have shown inappropriate behaviours
at the beginning of the mentoring relationship but these had diminished in the
context of the
one-to-one
relationships
where
students feel
valued and
have the
attention and
approval of
the mentor.
Figure 4: Mentor observed changes in distorted attributes displayed as
challenging behaviours (after 10-month relationships), n=12
Percentages
25%
20%
15%
10%
5%
0%
Survey response - Mentor - Observed distorted attributes
Belonging Mastery Independence Generosity
Attributes
Before mentoring
After 10 months plus mentoring

Standing Tall
Behaviours and attitudes which show distorted attributes
BELONGING
Guarded
Lonely
Aloof
Isolated
Distrustful
Figure 5
Percentage
MASTERY
Non achiever
Failure orientated
Avoids risks
Fears challenges
Unmotivated
Inadequate
Gives up easily
Figure 6: Mentor observed changes in negative attitudes and behaviours
(after 10 month relationships), n=12
20%
18%
16%
14%
12%
10%
8%
6%
4%
2%
0%
INDEPENDENCE
Submissive
Lacking confidence
Irresponsible
Sense of inferiority
Sense of helplessness
Easily led
Undisciplined
Survey response - Mentor - Observed negative attributes
Belonging Mastery Independence Generosity
Attributes
GENEROSITY
Selfish
Self absorbed
Narcisstic
Anti social
Exploitative
In the area of negative behaviours and attitudes teachers saw many of the students
who were referred to the program displayed behaviours and attitudes which
indicated a sense of isolation, a lack confidence and motivation. After ten months
mentoring they observed a drop in these attitude and behaviours particularly in
the area of belonging and mastery which could mean shifts in their sense of being
connected and motivated.
Figure 6
In the area of negative behaviours and attitudes mentors also observed a drop
in negative behaviours and attitudes in the areas of belonging, mastery and
independence with the greatest drop being in the area of independence as students
gained a sense of confidence that they could make choices. The mentors did not
observe any change in the negative behaviours around generosity.
Before mentoring
After 10 months plus mentoring

Developing a positive attitude to school
Standing Tall
When John started the mentoring relationship in Year 9 he was not enjoying
school and his teachers were well aware of his negative attitude. He was matched
with an engineer who shared many activities with him and also helped him a lot
with his maths and science in which he was struggling. However, by the middle
of Year 10 John could not see the relevance of school and he decided to leave. The
school endeavoured to change his mind but he was determined. The only person
he would listen to was his mentor who pointed out the long term implications of
the decision encouraging him to look more carefully at his options.
John found that he was able to do an ‘in school’ apprenticeship in hospitality.
He stayed at school and the teachers commented on his change of attitude and
his approach to his work. He intends to continue his education at the Australian
Technical College in Hamilton as well as completing his VCAL certificate.
A positive role model
The teacher referral for Matthew stated:
Matthew needs a really positive role model (male). He has low self
esteem but much potential. He seems to see excessively outgoing and
aggressive behaviour is the norm. As a result he is often sent out of
class. However I believe his ‘outgoing exuberance’ masks a worried,
fearful insecure person who wants to be good but needs good guidance
and a consistent, caring and interested approach. He needs someone
who will listen to his ideas and goals.
Matthew was matched with a manager of an agricultural training organisation.
The mentor provided a consistent and caring approach and a strong bond
developed. In the focus group the mentor spoke of his positive regard for
Matthew and stated ‘we are mates’. He was able to channel Matthew into a farm
apprenticeship. Matthew’s attitude to school has changed and teachers have
observed that he seems focused and has a strong sense of direction.
Benefits to the mentors
In Survey A most of the mentors stated that they felt that they had had benefited
from being in the program. In the mentor focus groups the following reasons were
given:
• the enjoyment of developing a trusting relationship with a young person
• the pleasure of coming to understand the world of young people and having a
greater understanding of the challenges they face
• seeing changes in their students which making them feel that they were doing
something worthwhile and making a difference
• leaving the busy world of work and having time to focus on getting to know a
young person
• feeling of being part of a team.

Standing Tall 0
Speech from mentor on receiving the Rotary Pride of
Workmanship Award with a local Rotary club
Thank you for asking me to be a mentor and giving me the excellent
training which has taught me how listen to young people. My time
being a mentor has been a great experience and seeing the change
in the young people in the programs is evident in the playground.
I wouldn’t have believed that an hour a week could change young
people’s lives but I see it every day. On the other side I have met so
many lovely mentors and I have started up friendships with them. So
it works both ways. It is a win-win situation.
Note: this mentor is a non teaching member of staff.
Benefits to the school
Both the Welfare Coordinator and Middle School Coordinator stated that engagement
of community members as mentors to students in the College was of great value in
supporting their roles within the school.
The Middle School Coordinator saw the development of relationships with caring
adults as a key factor for student engagement and he knew that there were students
who could benefit from more support than teachers could offer.
The Welfare Coordinator saw mentoring complementing her role as there were students
coming to see her because they wanted to be listened to. She also observed that some
students had reputations gained from past behaviour or home backgrounds leading to
them being stigmatised or labelled and their involvement with a mentor allowed them
the possibility of being seen with ‘fresh eyes’ thus offering them the opportunity to
change their perception of themselves. She mentioned a number of students she had seen
regularly in the past but who she had not seen since they started mentoring.
At the time of the evaluation Baimbridge College was undergoing an external review.
In the final report the Reviewer made special mention of the Standing Tall program,
stating it was an ‘asset’ to the school.
The Principal of the College gave the following feedback:
The Standing Tall Mentoring program has provided a support mechanism for
students in the Hamilton community that was sadly lacking. The resilience, self
esteem and engagement of many young people has been significantly improved
since this program was put in place. The benefit has not only been for those
at risk. Students with recognised talents have also been paired with mentors
who have extended their skills and expanded the horizons of the young people.
The concept that it ‘takes a whole village to raise a child ‘came to fruition with
this program. The provision of a ‘significant adult’ in the lives of the young
people involved in the program has created measurable differences that have
been acknowledged by the student mentors, their teachers and the parents.
The improved connection between the school and the community had been
an additional benefit, providing a shared appreciation of the needs of some
young people. The Standing Tall Mentoring program is a valuable method of
improving the opportunities for young people and enhancing the connection
between school and their communities.

Feedback from other schools
The following feedback was received from other schools in the region.
School Principal
Standing Tall 1
I think that it is a great concept and critical in building community
links but also in providing links with students who do not have positive
role models in their lives. The most problematic issue is around funding.
A Cluster Educator
My area is a Neighbourhood Renewal area. Generational poverty,
among other issues, has huge impact on how students are doing both at
school and in the community. There many kids who require the support
of a significant adult in their lives. Research indicates that this can have
a long lasting effect on students. My work is primarily around student
engagement and student outcomes. Any program which support students
and helps them feel better about themselves and more connected to the
community must be of value. I see huge value for the mentors too. ‘It
takes a village raise a child’. It would take time to establish, a continuity
of personnel, commitment from the school teacher students and the
wider community.
A Year 9 Coordinator
I am coordinating a very difficult group of Year 9 student this year. I
think that many of my students do not have any positive relationships
with older people. They often have very low self esteem and fall victim
to bad choices like drugs truancy and petty crime.
I have been working with a man who is an ex offender who works with
at risk youth and he told us earlier this year that having a mentor is the
only thing he knows that really works.
A School Chaplain
A mentoring program is desperately needed in our area as so many
students do not have adequate support through family, friends, other
community organisations to mentor life matters to them.
My role as chaplain is to mentor and journey alongside students but
the need is far greater and I am only able to do a portion of the work
required
The Standing Tall model is of value because it focuses on the student
and their initiation of the issues and having no agenda makes it a
unique program. Nearly every other program tries to set an agenda. but
this program takes the student from where they are and supports and
encourages them to meet their own goals.

Standing Tall 2
Reaching potential
Mark was a very at risk student in Year 9. He lived in a single parent family and his
accommodation situation was precarious. His family had been evicted from houses
on a number of occasions. In year 10 his mother was incarcerated and he was left
to the devices of a brother who intimidated him. He was an isolate in the school
setting and he was unable to get a part-time job in the community because of his
‘family background’. All these factors impacted on his confidence and self esteem.
Teachers could see he was very intelligent, had a positive attitude to his work and had
potential but there seemed to be too many risk factors for this ever to be realised.
In Year 11 a mentoring relationship was established with a business woman in
the community who supported him through the end of his secondary schooling.
When he had completed school she encouraged him in his decision to continue
with tertiary studies.
After completing his degree he sent the following letter to support the Standing
Tall program:
Benefits to the community
I would like to say that I am a student who has benefited from mentoring.
I have studied biotechnology at Monash University Gippsland. My mentor
has been important in helping achieve this. There are probably quite a few
students who, in their last years of secondary education, do not believe in
themselves enough to continue let alone consider themselves eligible for
future tertiary education. This is likely to be due to family problems, living
situations or misleading intimidation. My mentor has helped me conquer
my adversities just by providing valuable encouragement and allowing me
to explore my possibilities for the future.
I believe that if more people were assigned to help deserving (but
otherwise unlikely) students at Baimbridge College the school would
achieve an even more successful reputation for graduating students
fulfilling their dreams.
A theme running through the focus groups and the interviews with students and
focus groups with mentors was feeling of connection to the community because of
the links they had made. The following statement was made by the Uniting Church
minister who has agreed to be an ambassador for the program
The Standing Tall programme has been a wonderful development for
Baimbridge College, producing benefits which flow beyond the school to
the wider community. The Hamilton Uniting Church has been pleased
to support the programme financially and in other ways. A numbers of
church members serve as mentors and each of them speaks highly of
Standing Tall and the mutual enrichment ensuing to both mentors and
students. An important impact of the programme is its potential to be a
model and inspiration for other schools.
I have been delighted to act as an ambassador for Standing Tall and
unhesitatingly attest to the programme’s worth.
Rev Peter B Cook

Feedback from other stakeholders
working with youth
Perception regarding the program’s
effectiveness of mentors and students
Standing Tall
The Standing Tall program has sought to collaborate with other personnel who
work with youth in the community and the evaluation sought feedback to assess if
the program had made a contribution to their work.
Feedback from:
School Focused Youth Service Officer
In the recent School Focused Youth Service Youth Needs Analysis
for this region the young people surveyed stated bullying, not keeping
up with school, issues with friendships and family problems as their
top four concerns. Having a nurturing, caring and supporting mentor
can assist the young person in dealing with theses issues. One of the
recommendations of this analysis was to encourage early intervention
around relationship development. Mentoring provides this and gives
these young people a fabulous role model to learn how to interact with
other people and develop a significant relationship outside of their family.
Chairperson Southern Grampians Youth Network
The program fills a real need for rural young people particularly those
who may be isolated from their wider family circles, or who don’t
have opportunities to engage with others due to their geographical
location and family interest.
Glenelg and Southern Grampians Local Learning
Employment Network Executive Officer
The Glenelg and Southern Grampians Local Learning Employment
Network Inc (LLEN) is a state funded nor-for–profit organisation
that encourages partnerships and network to better provide facilities
opportunities for 15 to 19 year olds in the areas of education and
training and employment. The Standing Tall mentoring program has
been, and continues to be, one of the key strategies in the region that
assists to identify and maintain engagement with students who may
be at greater risk of disengaging from education.
The evaluation showed that both the mentors and the students had a positive
attitude to being in the program. All the mentors and the great majority of the
students said that they enjoyed being in the program confirming the positive
attitude of both the mentors and the students to the program.

Standing Tall
I think I have benefited from
being in the program
I feel I understand adolescents
more
Table 8: Mentors attitude to program and perceived benefits
(in relationships of 6 months or more) % of respondents, n=19
I would like to remain involved in
the mentoring program.
Strongly
agree
Agree
Don’t
know
Disagree
The need to modify or improve the
programmatic elements of the program
Strongly
disagree
Agree
(agree and
strongly
agree)
63% 32% 5% 95%
21% 63% 11% 89%
68% 32% 100%
I feel supported by the program 74% 26% 100%
I enjoy the activities I do with my
student
I would recommend the program to
a friend
68% 32% 100%
79% 21% 100%
I feel the training was of value 74% 21% 5% 95%
The program has been clear about
its goal and focus
I like being in the mentoring
program
58% 42% 100%
Table 9: Student’s attitude to program
(in relationships of 6 months or more), % of respondents, n=19
I enjoy the activities I do with my
mentor
I would recommend the program to
a friend
I would like to be involved in the
mentoring program for the rest of
the year.
All of the mentors and the great majority of the students indicated that they
enjoyed the activities that they engaged in.
The mentors stated that the focus and the goals of the program was clear and that
they felt supported by the program. Almost all said the training had been of value.
Strongly
agree
Agree
Don’t
know
Disagree
Strongly
disagree
Agree
(agree and
strongly
agree)
84% 11% 5% 95%
89% 5% 5% 95%
53% 26% 21% 79%
84% 16% 84%
In the focus groups the mentors indicated that they would like more feedback so
that they could have faith that the effort they were putting in was of value and
having an impact. This is something that the program needs to explore further.

Standing Tall
The mentors also stated that they would have liked to be given more information
concerning the home situations of their mentees and why they had been referred
to the program. This is a delicate issue because the program works on the principle
mentors should look at students with ‘fresh eyes’ and have no preconceptions. The
intention of the program is students will talk to the mentors and reveal things
when they trust the mentors and if is what they want to reveal. However, the
issue of whether to provide more information needs to be examined. and if, in
some situations, information about a student will be of value and will help the
mentors understand attitudes and reactions they encounter, it will be given. An
understanding of the complexity of challenges faced by students could be included
in the training.
* No real names of students in the program have been used in this evaluation
* Photographs used are of participants in the program

Standing Tall
Chapter 7
Conclusions
What we give today determines
the quality of tomorrow.
Michael Powell
‘A Thousand Paths To Generosity’

Findings
Standing Tall
The rationale for setting up the Standing Tall school-based mentoring program at
Baimbridge College was a belief that the establishment of supportive relationships
between community members and school students would lead to positive outcomes
for those students at risk of disengaging from school.
Research shows these outcomes are only likely to accrue if a strong emotional bond
is established. The evaluation sought to assess if this had occurred and if positive
outcomes could be identified.
The evaluation showed the mentors in the program have been effective in creating
strong relationships. All students reported that they felt they were liked, listened
to and accepted by their mentors. Most of the mentors also believed that trust had
been built up in the relationships. In the focus groups the mentors spoke about the
wide range of activities, projects and support for school work they had undertaken
in response to the individual needs of students.
Personal and school related outcomes were identified by students, mentors and
teachers. After six months a large percentage of students stated they were more
confident and this was supported by the observations of most of mentors. The
majority of the students stated that their relationships with their peers and family
had improved although most of the mentors were not aware of this.
Most of the mentors stated that they believed their student’s attitudes to school
had improved with almost three-quarters of the students agreeing. This could be
because mentors often help their students recognise the relevance of their education
to their future aspirations. A majority of students stated that they believed that
the school cared about them, an important factor in a student feeling connected to
school.
After ten months of mentoring both teachers and mentors noted shifts to more
positive attitudes and behaviours. Teachers observed a shift to greater cooperation
and increased motivation and mentors observed that a number of students were
taking more responsibility for their actions and displaying a greater sense of caring
for other people. In light of the research on factors influencing engagement, all
these changes increase the likelihood of the students engaging with the school.
Although academic outcomes were not assessed, anecdotally a number of teachers
reported improvements.
Research has shown that stronger communities are built when the interaction
between different ages is increased. The Standing Tall program set up relationships
between different age and socio-economic groups. The Evaluation indicated
that both students and mentors had benefited from these relationships. All the
mentors stated they enjoyed the activities they did with their students and most
of the students agreed. All the students stated that they enjoyed having an adult
as a friend and in the focus groups mentors stated that they enjoyed coming to
understand the world their students inhabited and the challenges they faced.
As in most schools, records at Baimbridge indicate that boys are over represented
in terms of behavioural issues leading to time outs and suspension. The findings

Standing Tall
show boys respond well to the support and encouragement afforded to them in
a mentoring relationship. Even though there have been a number of girls in the
program, the relationships have not lasted as long and have not had the same
impact. There could be a number of reasons for this. Girls tend to have stronger
networks and thus which give them stronger social and emotional support. It is
interesting that most referrals to the program are boys.
The program has worked closely with personnel in the school, with both teachers
and coordinators making referrals. Personnel in the school have observed that the
mentors complement their roles in the school with the school principal stating:
The program has provided a support mechanism for students in the
Hamilton community that was sadly lacking. The connection between
the school and the community has been an additional benefit, providing
a shared appreciation of the needs of some young people.
Feedback from other schools in the Barwon South West Region indicated that the
concept of mentoring could be of value in confronting the challenges they faced.
All the mentors stated that the program was clear about its goals and focus and
they in turn were clear about their role with most stating that the training was of
value. All stated that they felt supported by the program and would like to stay in
the program.
Feedback from agencies working with young people and the Local Learning
and Education Network indicated their belief that community involvement in
supporting young people was of value in assisting them in their roles.
Many of the key elements underlying the Standing Tall program, are based on best
practice according to the research literature which could have contributed to the
findings. These elements include:
• recruiting suitable mentors
The program was careful to choose mentors who had the appropriate attitudes
and skills. The screening process was designed to find mentors who were nonjudgmental,
had good communication skills, showed that they were respectful of
young people and willing to make a commitment. The mentors also needed to be
mature because mentoring relationships can be complex.
• appropriate and support of mentors
Mentors were given a nine-hour training seesion to provide them with h gave
a rationale for mentoring, a clear outline of the principles of the program, an
understanding of the role that they would play and skills to carry out the role.
Once the mentors were in the program they were supported and given any feedback
passed on by the teachers.
• needs of the young person
Mentors were encouraged to build up a friendship with their student with the aim
of gaining trust and then participating in a wide range activities and projects with
the mentee based on individual needs of the student. They were able to use the
resources and the personnel at the school if necessary.
• working with the school
The staff at the school were given a clear understanding of the purpose of the
mentoring program so they could see how it could support their teaching practices
and benefit with students needing extra support. Teachers were encouraged to give
feedback if they were aware of any positive outcomes for the students. The program
also worked with the Welfare Coordinator to make sure that mentoring was the

Conclusions
Standing Tall
appropriate intervention for the students chosen. Both the Welfare Coordinator
and the School Support staff were very supportive when mentors confronted
particular issues so that the best outcomes were achieved for the students.
• early intervention
Teachers from Grade 3 upwards were invited to make referrals to the program
is they believed that they had a student in their class who could benefit from the
program.
• length of relationship
Research shows that mentoring relationships need to have longevity to be effective
and all the mentors are asked to make a commitment for at least 12 months.
Most mentors are, in fact, in the program for a much longer period of time and
supporting relationships as long as they and the student wanted to be involved.
• clear messages about mentoring
Mentoring is a concept which can easily be misunderstood and it was important
that the school and community understood that that mentoring is about
empowering young people to realise their potential through identifying their assets
rather than rescuing, ‘fixing up’ or changing a young person. It is not a replacement
for other vital roles that teachers, counsellors and parents fulfil.
These findings show that energising and engaging the community through
a mentoring program can assist schools to find proactive ways to address
disengagement. It would appear that there is truth in the statement made by the
Mayor of the Southern Grampians Shire during Youth Mentoring Week 2007:
The Standing Tall program is a great example of how a community
can form a partnership with a school to give young people a chance to
fulfil their potential. The program also allows for community building
and a real sense of achievement for the students and the mentors
involved in the program. It helps to show young people that they live
in a community that cares and that they are never alone. It brings out
the true sense of community and it will hold residents of the Southern
Grampians Shire in good stead in the future.
However it would be of value if the participants could be tracked to see if the shifts
in behaviours and attitudes lasted over time and had an impact on the futures
pathways of the young people and their engagement with school.
Areas requiring further investigation include:
• ongoing training for mentors
• how much information mentors should be provides with the start of the
relationship
• protocols regarding contact between mentors and students during the long
break over the summer vacation

Standing Tall 0
General observations
Engaging and energising the community to support young people through schoolbased
mentoring is an attractive idea. The appreciation of the program by personnel
at Baimbridge College and the strong response from other schools in the region
would indicate that the idea resonates with personnel working in a system where
they are pressured to achieve better educational outcomes but have to grapple with
the realities of the many challenges faced by students impeding their ability to
engage with what is offered. Disengagement of students, which often presents itself
in schools as challenging behaviours, can be a tremendous drain on the resources of
a school. Research shows the importance of students feeling valued and connected
in a supportive environment. Mentoring offers a possibility for the community
to support schools in reaching their objectives. However such an opportunity for
beneficial partnership between the school and community must not be squandered.
Careful consideration must be paid when of setting up such programs with best
practice adhered to so the best possible outcomes are achieved.
Recommendations
• That school based mentoring be considered by the education sector, the
business sector and the community as a worthwhile intervention to energise
the community to support young people to take full advantage of their
education
• That school based mentoring programs be based on what has been identified
as best practice
• That program co-coordinators of school-based mentoring programs be
supported to develop appropriate skills, knowledge and resources
• That school-based mentoring programs have a good understanding of schools
and be able to communicate the value of mentoring so that mentoring is
accepted as a credible practice in enabling schools achieve their outcomes
• That there be a understanding that school-based mentoring programs are
complex and take time to develop in order to be effective
• That there be further research into the different aspects of school based
mentoring to further increase its effectiveness as an intervention of value.

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Standing Tall 1
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Standing Tall 2
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Standing Tall
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Standing Tall
Appendix
STANDING TALL
SCHOOL BASED MENTORING PROGRAM
SURVEY
STUDENT .....................................................................................................
MENTOR/TEACHER ......................................................................................
............................................................ been in the Standing Tall mentoring
program for ........................ months.
it would be appreciated if you could circle your present observations of
........................
Many thanks
Jeanette Pritchard
BACKGROUND OF SURVEY
This survey is built on a North American study called the Circle of Courage. The theory states that
young people have certain needs and these needs must be met for young people to have productive lives
and reach their potential. These are
THE NEED TO BELONG
The need to be valued, connected, approved of affirmed.
THE NEED FOR MASTERY
The need to feel competent and be to achieve
THE NEED FOR INDEPENDENCE
The need to have power over their world
THE NEED FOR GENEROSITY
The need to feel that they can make a contribution to the well being of others.
Young people can show behaviour or attitudes which show the need is met, absent or is being met in a
way which is not helpful and thus leads to distorted behaviours
PRESENT OBSERVATIONS
BELONGING
Attached
Friendly
Gregarious
Co-operative
Trusting
Dependant on peer approval
Craves acceptance
Overly dependant
Attention seeking
Guarded
Lonely
Aloof
Isolated
Distrustful

MASTERY
Achiever
Successful
Creative
Problem-solver
Motivated
Persistent
INDEPENDENCE
Autonomous
Confident
Assertive
Takes responsibility
Inner control
Self discipline
Leadership
GENEROSITY
Altruistic
Caring
Sharing
Loyal
Empathetic
Pro-social
Supportive
OTHER COMMENTS
Overachievement
Risk seeker
Arrogant
Cheater
Dictatorial
Reckless/macho
Bullies others
Manipulative
Rebellious
Defiant of authority
Over involved with others
concerns
Playing martyr
Co dependant
Dependent on the approval of
others
Non achiever
Failure orientated
Avoids risks
Fears challenges
Unmotivated
Inadequate
Gives up easily
Standing Tall
Submissive
Lacking confidence
Irresponsible
Sense of inferiority
Sense of helplessness
Easily led
Undisciplined
Selfish
Self absorbed
Narcisstic
Anti social
Exploitative
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Standing Tall
Mentor focus group questions
MAIN QUESTION
What can we learn about developing a mentoring relationship with a young person which leads to trust
and allows a bond to develop?
INTRODUCTORY STATEMENT
What I enjoy about mentoring is ...
1) What do you think works best in building a mentoring relationship
2) How have your mentoring relationships changed and what do you think triggered those changes?
3) I presume that you have all had challenges
4) Give me some examples
5) What sorts of things did you do to overcome them?
6) Looking back, what sorts of things would have been helpful in starting the relationship?
7) Now you have been in the program for a period of time what sorts of things would be helpful in
supporting you with the relationship?
8) Has the mentoring experience been what you expected?
STUDENT INTERVIEW
1) Was the program what you expected?
2) What do you enjoy?
3) What have been your achievements
4) What have you learnt about your mentor?
5) What do you appreciate about your mentor?

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