Celebratory events for Year 10 Mentoring Works students
ELBA’s Year 10 Mentoring Works 2016-17 programme, for Hackney and Haringey schools and their City mentor partners, came to an end this month with two recognition events. The celebration events were kindly hosted by Schroders and Linklaters and included students, mentors and school and company coordinators from across our programme partnerships.
This year, a total of 150 students have been supported by 87 mentors. Successful partnerships have continued between Schroders and Mossbourne Community Academy, CMS and Cardinal Pole Catholic School, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Haggerston School and Linklaters with two school partners; Clapton Girls’ Academy and Northumberland Park Community School.
The students have been meeting their mentors fortnightly for the past nine months and have covered a range of topics. Groups fed back and noted that sessions had included CV writing, interview techniques, presentation skills, university options, career options, finding work experience, networking and business skills, revision, organisational skills, meeting their mentors’ colleagues and taking City tours.
Mentors and students gave speeches at the event and we were delighted to hear the impact mentoring had made. One student said:
“It has helped us to change; we have gained more confidence and skills and it has also helped us to prepare for the future”
Students completed evaluation and feedback activities and when asked to sum up the mentoring experience in one word, students chose: “inspirational, interesting, magic, rewarding, enjoyable, intriguing, astonishing, beneficial, helpful, liberating, joyous, cool, incredible, awesome, exciting and fun”. Mentors also spoke and shared their experiences with one mentor noting:
“It has been a very rewarding experience meeting the students and seeing their eagerness for learning and knowledge and watching them progress.”
As well as the speeches from mentors and students we heard from our CSR contacts too, who commented on the “independence, responsibility, drive and determination” students had shown by volunteering for a programme outside of school hours and wished them all the success for the future. Selina Uddin, ELBA’s Programme Director for Community and Education spoke to the students about making the most of what they have learnt from the programme and they can continue to benefit from having mentors and being a mentor, throughout their working life.
Mentoring Works now looks forward to continuing the programme with the next cohort of Year 10’s in the new academic year!
