HB at-risk youths to get mentors

DOUG LAING
A youth mentoring programme being promoted by Napier police Youth Services has taken little time to attract a couple of likely participants ahead of its launch tomorrow. An advertisement at the weekend sought interest from prospective mentors to help guide selected youths through the challenges of growing up.
Youth Development officer Constable Warren Sloss said adults were wanted to be trained for one-to-one voluntary roles with young people seen in need of help facing the everyday challenges of teenage life.
Each volunteer and young person is matched according to interests and the estimated commitment is two to four hours a week, Mr Sloss said.
By mid-morning yesterday two people had already contacted the police, one with a background of nine years as a youth mentor in Hawaii, said Youth Development Section member Donna Pellett.
While billed locally as a "new" programme, it was founded in North America in 1904 and has networks in 33 countries. It has been operating in Nelson for nine years.
Members of the Napier section visited Nelson for two days, and were encouraged by statistics which said that those mentored over the years were significantly less likely to be truants or become involved in drug use than others who came to police notice.
The programme is not designed to replace the young people's parents, but has been shown to improve some of the young people's relationships with parent.
The scheme will be launched with a presentation to agencies tomorrow and to the public at Eastern Police District Headquarters, Dalton House, at 7pm.
Mr Sloss said it would be an introduction for adults, but before mentoring relationships could be established, training workshops and other processes could take six months.