Auckland University is looking for a sponsor and about 60 students to act as mentors for high school pupils in a local trial of an acclaimed Israeli mentoring scheme.
The university's director of student administration, Kay Wills, is proposing a trial for the scheme to start next yearin selected schools in low-income areas of Auckland.
The Israeli scheme, called Perach, pays 26,200 university student-mentors half of their course fees to spend two two-hour sessions a week with pupils aged nine to 13 in low-income neighbourhoods.
Here the pilot scheme is likely to involve just 60 student-mentors working with high school pupils.
But Kay Wills said the amount they could be paid would depend on finding corporate sponsorship.
"I think it's a brilliant scheme, but it's hugely expensive," she said.
"Just looking into the travel costs to marry up the mentor with the pupil is really expensive - Auckland does not have a good public transport system, and I was looking at the most absolutely discounted bus fares available for students."
The scheme was introduced to the university by a member of the university's community advisory group, journalist Lesley Max, who saw Perach in operation in Israel in 1999. Its director, Amos Carmeli, met officials in Auckland and Wellington in January.
Kay Wills said it was important to start with a pilot scheme with just 60 students to see "whether we can pick up something from a different culture and totally duplicate it, or slightly modify it to suit New Zealand conditions."
She said several schools already had mentoring schemes, and the pilot would probably be in schools that did not have existing schemes. There was national potential.
