One key to the effectiveness of mentoring as an intervention is the nature of the relationship established between a youth and his/her mentor. Each JUMP project is structured to support a relationship that will address its own uniquely defined project goals. A project that emphasizes improvement in school performance may look for the mentoring relationship to be based on formal tutoring sessions during the school day. Other projects that seek to provide more general support, encouragement, and enrichment for youth at risk may focus on social and cultural activities that the mentor and youth choose for themselves and carry out independently of any formal structure. In this chapter we present some of the project considerations when making matches, and some characteristics of the matches that are reported.

This information, gathered at the same time that the information about youth and mentors was being compiled, represents primarily those matches that were active during the period between October 1, 1997 and December 31, 1997. It includes only matches for which corresponding information also was available for both the youth and the mentors involved.

Cohort I agencies reported 1,666 matches, and Cohort II reported 986 matches for the period in question. The fact that there are more matches reported for Cohort I than there are mentors reflects the practice of some agencies to match multiple youth to a single mentor who is willing and able to work with more than one youth.

Waiting Time for a Match is Relatively Brief

There is an average of 2.7 months from the time of enrollment to the date a match is reported to be made. This value may be somewhat distorted by the fact that about 42% of the matches appeared to have a zero wait time. Because of the way the information is recorded, it is unclear at this point whether these youth actually were matched upon their entry into the project, or if they, in fact, waited some period to be matched. Regardless, there are some interesting patterns that emerge from the data that grantees provided. Boys wait, on average, about three weeks longer than girls to be paired with a mentor. Non-white youth wait about 3.5 weeks longer than white youth. There was no significant difference between cohorts, and no difference between JUMP projects affiliated with BB/BS and non-affiliated projects. The longer wait times for boys and non-whites likely reflects the preponderance of white-female mentors and grantee desire to match on race and gender.

Most Projects Use Gender as a Matching Criteria

When making a match, gender is a strong determining factor. For those matches in which the gender of both the youth and the mentor was reported, male mentors were matched with boys 96.8% of the time, and female mentors were matched with girls 86.4% of the time. Only 2.3% of the girls are matched with a male mentor, however, 18.0% of the boys are matched with a female mentor. This may reflect the preponderance of women in the mentor pool. Whether same or cross-gender matches are better is not clear. Since girls are just as likely to be raised in a family without an adult male figure, it is reasonable to hypothesize that girls may benefit from a positive mentoring relationship with a man. However, the relative scarcity of male mentors, and the desire to match on gender means that, in practice, girls are rarely matched with male mentors. The mentor/mentee gender relationship is summarized in Exhibit 5:1.

Race and Ethnicity Are Match Considerations

Although most of the agencies report that they do not use race as a match criteria, there appears to be a strong relationship between mentor and mentee race and ethnicity. About 60% of all youth are paired with a mentor of the same race/ethnicity. Since white mentors outnumber white youth by more than 2 to 1, it is understandable that many white mentors are paired with non-white youth. In those instances where youth and mentors are of different race/ethnicity, it is almost always a non-white youth paired with a white mentor (81.7% of the time). Asian mentors also outnumber Asian youth, so they also frequently are paired with youth of differing ethnicity. The opposite is true for African American, Hispanic, and American Indian mentors. For these groups, the youth outnumber the mentors so most of the mentors in these groups are paired with youth of their same ethnicity. For instance, 93% of African American mentors are paired with African American youth, and 71% of the Hispanic mentors are paired with Hispanic youth.

From the youth perspective, 92% of white youth are paired with a white mentor, while only 57.4% of African American youth, and 32.8% of Hispanic youth are paired with a mentor of the same race/ethnicity. It appears that a same-race match is made whenever possible. However, when minority mentors are not available, minority youth most often are paired with white mentors.

As discussed in Chapter 2, some agencies have developed more successful approaches for recruiting minority mentors and further research will be important to learn about effective recruitment practices that are sustained over a longer period of time. To date, there is little or no research that would support an assessment of whether same-race/ethnicity mentor matches are more effective or successful than cross-race matches. Either way, a successful mentoring relationship almost certainly depends on both the needs of the youth and the skills and sensitivity of the mentor.

Match Longevity Reflects Project Models

The data available at the time information was gathered for this report are interim data and reflect ongoing mentor-youth matches. Because of this, accurate measures of match longevity are not currently available. Only 9.6% of the recorded matches had end dates, which indicated that the match was terminated at the time of reporting. The median length for terminated matches was approximately 6.5 months, with the termination dates often corresponding to the end of the school year. Many school-based projects routinely end matches in June and re-initiate them again in the fall at the beginning of the following school year. In January, when data for this report was gathered, the median length of continuing matches was 3.9 months. Note that this also fits the general pattern of school-year matching, and closely corresponds to a project model that initiates new matches each September when classes resume after the summer break. In future research, we will investigate more thoroughly the factors that relate to match longevity as we obtain information that is recorded for a longer period of time.

JUMP project staff continue to refine their models, strengthen their mentor recruitment, and learn more about the factors that impact the longevity and ultimate long term success of the mentoring intervention in preventing school failure, dropping out, and involvement in delinquent and gang activities. While assessment of long term outcomes requires follow up studies, there are hopeful indications that mentoring does make a positive difference. The following chapter presents a discussion of the mentoring promise.

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1998 Report to Congress: Juvenile Mentoring Program		OJJDP Report December 1998