Guest Post: Jeff Walker

Today's post is from one of my AmeriCorps colleagues who helped facilitate the introduction of the Men in Mentoring Toolkit.

Thanks Jeff!

Hello, I’m AmeriCorps Member Jeff Walker and I serve with the 4-H Mentor Michigan Initiative in Muskegon and Ottawa County. Since joining with AmeriCorps, my experience has been both rewarding and challenging. I coordinate the Men In Mentoring Initiative and I primarily recruit male volunteers to become mentors.

As I recruit, I’m finding out that many men are afraid to mentor because of how they may be perceived by others. They are only viewing the negative hindrances without seeing the big picture of the benefits mentoring has to offer. Most are even unaware of what mentoring is until a program like, Big Brothers big Sisters is mentioned. I have personally spoken with over a dozen men who have verbally expressed interest, but it faded away as we discussed the commitment factor involved.

I think by having this Men In Mentoring Toolkit in place will provide valuable key information and terms to the approach and verbal engagement with potential volunteers. I believe when you are able to communicate on the same level as another individual that makes them more comfortable within their own “element”.

As one of the presenters during our workshop, I now have more confidence moving forward in the recruiting process. The most important thing to remember is how to use and phrase your words. We have to be fully aware of the words that will trigger further resistance or fear for the volunteer.

Sharing the Toolkit with Fellow AmeriCorps Members

Last month, I had the privilege of introducing this toolkit to a group of fellow AmeriCorps members in Roscommon, MI along with five of my colleagues.

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We began by introducing the toolkit and explaining how and why it was developed. Two of my colleagues who focus on recruiting male mentors contributed by explaining the challenges they have faced in their own jobs, as well as some helpful success stories.

Then, we split the large group into several smaller groups and asked them to do something uncomfortable: Roleplay.

We asked each group to have one person play the role of new recruit and another person to play the role of mentor recruiter -- and to put some of these new techniques into practice.

The roleplay proved to be uncomfortable, but that was part of the point. We asked the group to consider how uncomfortable it might be to put these techniques into practice in a "real" situation had they not taken part in the roleplay beforehand. We agreed that the roleplay did feel a bit awkward but that facing that discomfort now will reap rewards in the future.

We closed the session with a large-group dialogue by bringing specific issues that small groups faced to the fore and posing them as topics of conversation for everyone. All in all, our collaborative efforts generated a list of ideas that was much bigger than any of us could have produced on our own. And that's the type of collaboration we would love to see here.

If you have have downloaded and viewed the toolkit, please tell us what you think! Our efforts as individuals in our local communities are valuable, and by ourselves we can accomplish a great deal. But for mentoring to continue to grow in Michigan it's going to take more than just me in my community and you in yours. It's going to take us in ours.

Join the conversation.