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Mentoring in America 2005: A Snapshot of the Current State of Mentoring

NCJ Number
214624
Date Published
2006
Length
20 pages
Annotation
This report presents findings from a 2005 survey designed to assess the state of mentoring in America.
Abstract
The survey found that 3,000,000 adults have formal, one-to-one mentoring relationships with youth, a 19-percent increase since the last survey in 2002. Ninety-six percent of these mentors would recommend mentoring to others. Forty-four million American adults who are not currently mentoring a youth would seriously consider doing so. Although the average mentoring relationship lasts 9 months, 38 percent last at least 1 year. The survey found that the majority of mentors are willing to work with youth in difficult or unique situations, including children of incarcerated parents, youth with disabilities, and immigrant youth. Despite the documented progress in increasing mentoring relationships since 2002, the findings also indicate there is still much work to do. There are millions of youth who could benefit from but are without a mentor. The survey used two waves of surveys of 1,000 respondents in order to ensure a sufficient number of mentors were in the sample; nonmentors were also surveyed. For the purposes of the survey, "mentoring" was defined as "a relationship, formal or informal, between an adult and a young person age 10 to 18 that occurred in the past 12 months." Respondents were asked to indicate whether the mentoring relationship was conducted informally or within a structured program that included the support of an organization. 12 charts