Millinocket, Union 113 pursue adult mentor program

MILLINOCKET – Officials in the Millinocket School Department and School Union 113 are working to organize a mentoring program involving students and adults in the community.

Similar to the Big Brothers Big Sisters of America program, the mentors would work inside and outside the classroom with the emotional and human relations needs of young people, and allow teachers to focus more on instruction, according to Keith Ober, interim superintendent for both school districts.

“This is someone just to tell a kid they’re important – to have an adult that cares,” Ober said Friday.

Under the working concept, guidance counselors serving in the two systems would identify students to participate, while school personnel and parents would approve the activities, Ober said. For student safety, potential mentors also would have to be approved by school officials, he said.

While the program was originally envisioned for the high schools, it is now being looked at for all the schools, Ober said. At the elementary school level, mentors could read to a class or help organize a project, while mentors could be a sounding board for problems or just shoot basketballs with a high school student, he said.

Mentors also could supplement the teaching process by monitoring homework or offering academic assistance, Ober said. The use of mentors in education fits with the region’s vision statement from earlier this year that pushed for innovative and cost-effective education and the use of community resources, he said.

Less formal than a schoolteacher, a mentor could aid in the advancement of students with alternative learning methods simply by listening to their academic challenges and offering suggestions, Ober said.

There just aren’t enough resources for every student, Ober said.

“Mentors could take on the challenge of kids who may have a chance of being kicked out [of school],” he said.

The program also can benefit adults by bringing them back in touch with a part of the community from which they may be removed, Ober said.

“It opens the doors of schools for folks, so there’s more of a level of comfort with [the schools] for the larger population,” Ober said.

The Training and Development Corp. is surveying adults to find potential mentors, Ober said. The program could start any time in this school year and even carry over into the summer, he said. Adults interested in becoming mentors should contact the guidance counselors at Schenck and Stearns high schools or the Katahdin Time Dollar Exchange.