A Process and Outcome Evaluation of the 4-H Mentoring/ Youth and ...

YFP/4-H Mentoring Evaluation
More recently, Bernstein and his colleagues at Abt Associates conducted an assessment
of the Department of Education’s student mentoring program (Bernstein, Dun Rappaport, Olsho,
Hunt & Levin, 2009). The program, which targets students in grades 4-8, focuses on the
academic and social needs of at-risk students. The study included 2,573 students who were
eligible to participate in one of 32 programs during the 2005 and 2006 school years. The students
were randomly assigned to the mentoring program or to a control group. The study measured 17
outcomes in three domains: interpersonal relationships and personal responsibility, academic
achievement and engagement, and high-risk or delinquent behavior. No significant impacts were
found in any of the outcomes measured, although some positive outcomes were observed for
girls, and younger students showed a decrease in truancy.
In their meta-analysis of 55 mentoring programs, Dubois, Holloway, Valentine, and
Cooper (2002) found modest improvements in academic performance, emotional functioning,
and prosocial behavior among program participants. They observed larger effect sizes for
programs that instituted a careful selection process for prospective mentors, maintained
supervision of mentors during program operations, tracked program activities, and informed
participants that the mentor-mentee relationship could be expected to continue for a long time.
More recently, Patrick Tolan and his colleagues completed a Campbell systematic review
of 39 mentoring programs (Tolan et al., 2008). The review was restricted to studies that
examined delinquency, aggression, substance use or academic achievement in mentored youth
and a comparison group. The results of the review showed positive and statistically significant
main effects for all four types of outcomes, with larger effects observed for delinquency and
aggression than for drug use and achievement (Tolan et al., 2008).
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