Summary

What we know

  • There is a range of risk factors that may make young people of any ethnicity more likely to engage in antisocial behaviours. These factors include the young person’s own attitudes; relationships within the family; and growing up in communities where there is widespread violence, alcohol and other substance abuse, poverty, poor health and poor-quality housing. Indigenous young people face the additional challenges of dispossession, discontinuity of culture and intergenerational trauma.
  • A strong connection to culture—coupled with high self-esteem, a strong sense of autonomy, and with living in cohesive, functioning families and communities—can be protective factors that result in Indigenous young people choosing productive life pathways.
  • Mentoring is a relationship intervention strategy that can assist in building some of these protective factors. A growing body of research demonstrates that mentoring can have powerful and lasting positive effects in improving behavioural, academic and vocational outcomes for at-risk youth and, to a more limited extent, in reducing contact with juvenile justice systems.
  • In an Indigenous context, mentoring is a particularly promising initiative because it fits well with Indigenous teaching and learning styles and can help to build strong collective ties within a community.
  • Mentoring programs can involve adult or peer mentors and can be implemented in a range of ways, such as one-on-one or in groups.
  • Although positive results can be achieved with single-intervention mentoring for at risk youth, integrating mentoring into broader programs produces a greater level of positive change.
  • The way the mentoring program is run and the nature of the relationship between mentor and mentee are crucial in determining the outcomes of youth mentoring programs.What we know
  • There is a range of risk factors that may make young people of any ethnicity more likely to engage in antisocial behaviours. These factors include the young person’s own attitudes; relationships within the family; and growing up in communities where there is widespread violence, alcohol and other substance abuse, poverty, poor health and poor-quality housing. Indigenous young people face the additional challenges of dispossession, discontinuity of culture and intergenerational trauma.
  • A strong connection to culture—coupled with high self-esteem, a strong sense of autonomy, and with living in cohesive, functioning families and communities—can be protective factors that result in Indigenous young people choosing productive life pathways.
  • Mentoring is a relationship intervention strategy that can assist in building some of these protective factors.

A growing body of research demonstrates that mentoring can have powerful and lasting positive effects in improving behavioural, academic and vocational outcomes for at-risk youth and, to a more limited extent, in reducing contact with juvenile justice systems.

  • In an Indigenous context, mentoring is a particularly promising initiative because it fits well with Indigenous teaching and learning styles and can help to build strong collective ties within a community.
  • Mentoring programs can involve adult or peer mentors and can be implemented in a range of ways, such as one-on-one or in groups.
  • Although positive results can be achieved with single-intervention mentoring for at risk youth, integrating mentoring into broader programs produces a greater level of positive change.
  • The way the mentoring program is run and the nature of the relationship between mentor and mentee are crucial in determining the outcomes of youth mentoring programs.

What works

At the level of program design and implementation, what works includes the following:

  • Starting mentoring before Indigenous young people exhibit antisocial or criminal behaviour. This is the most effective strategy, although starting mentoring after they have begun engaging in these behaviours can still achieve positive results.
  • Obtaining the input of the local Indigenous community in the design and delivery of mentoring and related programs.
  • Involving Elders where possible in transmitting cultural knowledge to young people through a mentoring relationship.
  • Having strong partnerships between the agency running the mentoring program and other youth counselling, health and employment services in the local area.

Within the mentoring relationship, what works includes the following:

  • Long-term mentoring relationships of at least 12–18 months duration, based on common interests, mutual respect, genuine friendship, fun and a non-judgemental approach.
  • Mentoring that continues to support the young person as they consolidate positive changes.
  • Consistent, regular contact between mentor and mentee. In the initial stages, this may need to be quite intensive (up to 10–20 hours per week), depending on the young person’s needs.
  • Involvement of Indigenous parents in the mentoring relationship, which can improve parent-child relationships.
  • Mentors who have ‘been there, done that’. Mentors who have experienced similar challenges to those facing the mentee and proven their success in overcoming negative life circumstances are the most influential in achieving positive behavioural change.

What doesn’t work

Short-term mentoring (generally 6 months or less) is not generally effective.

  • Mentoring is unlikely to produce any change where there is infrequent or irregular contact between mentor and mentee, where the mentor is authoritarian or judgemental, or where there is too much emphasis on expected behavioural change rather than first building a friendship.
  • Too many goals can cause the mentee to become discouraged and give up.
  • Mentoring by peers is not an effective replacement for mentoring by adults.

What we don’t know

  • The relative effectiveness of strategies such as gender-specific mentoring, matching mentor and mentee along racial or ethnic lines, and using paid versus volunteer mentors are debated in the literature and require further exploration.
  • Further longitudinal research is required into whether the benefits of youth mentoring are maintained into adulthood.
  • Although mentoring is repeatedly demonstrated to improve a range of outcomes for Indigenous young people that indirectly help to reduce crime, a direct link to crime reduction is not clear in the studies reviewed here.What works

At the level of program design and implementation, what works includes the following:

  • Starting mentoring before Indigenous young people exhibit antisocial or criminal behaviour. This is the most effective strategy, although starting mentoring after they have begun engaging in these behaviours can still achieve positive results.
  • Obtaining the input of the local Indigenous community in the design and delivery of mentoring and related programs.
  • Involving Elders where possible in transmitting cultural knowledge to young people through a mentoring relationship.
  • Having strong partnerships between the agency running the mentoring program and other youth counselling, health and employment services in the local area.

Within the mentoring relationship, what works includes the following:

  • Long-term mentoring relationships of at least 12–18 months duration, based on common interests, mutual respect, genuine friendship, fun and a non-judgemental approach.
  • Mentoring that continues to support the young person as they consolidate positive changes.
  • Consistent, regular contact between mentor and mentee. In the initial stages, this may need to be quite intensive (up to 10–20 hours per week), depending on the young person’s needs.
  • Involvement of Indigenous parents in the mentoring relationship, which can improve parent-child relationships.
  • Mentors who have ‘been there, done that’. Mentors who have experienced similar challenges to those facing the mentee and proven their success in overcoming negative life circumstances are the most influential in achieving positive behavioural change.