Mentoring in San Diego

San Diego County was one of 150 communities to send a delegation to the 1997 President's Summit on Youth - America's Promise, chaired by General Colin Powell. The San Diego delegation to "America's Promise " returned home and enlisted The Children's Initiative to convene a local coalition of mentoring programs. The initial purpose in creating the Mentoring Coalition was to inspire a "collaborative spirit" that would be inclusive of every sector of the community. The Coalition would begin to look at ideas and methods to not just increase mentoring in individual agencies, but to look at creating a directory of San Diego County mentoring programs, plan and implement joint trainings, and explore ideas for joint publicity materials to better utilize limited dollars.

Staffed by The Children's Initiative, the Coalition has met monthly since 1998, providing no-cost trainings, technical assistance resources, sharing of best practices and networking opportunities for more than 40 mentoring programs throughout San Diego County. Membership includes a wide variety of community, school, faith-based and private organizations. In addition, other supportive organizations such as Volunteer San Diego, the City Attorney's Office and local businesses actively participate in Coalition activities.

The Mentoring Coalition is the only project of its kind in San Diego. Without the Coalition, mentoring programs would have very limited access to: knowing what works and best practices for working with at-risk youth; one-on-one and small group technical assistance to build capacity and recruit appropriate mentors; and specific trainings and support in working with youth who are at-risk. The Mentoring Coalition coordinates with mentoring organization and with referral entities to help them meet standards related to the recruitment, screening, training, and matching of volunteer mentors.

The Mentoring Coalition of San Diego County invites all mentor organizations to enrich your program through attendance of trainings. Volunteer to "Spotlight" your program at one of these events. For more details on upcoming trainings please click here. Please call The Children's Initiative at 858-581-5887 for any additional information.