At a recent meeting, Susan Buglass, (Partnership and Mentor Recruitment Manager), introduced The Nine to MCR Pathways.
MCR supports young people who are care-experienced, experiencing vulnerability or disadvantage, to have equality of educational outcomes, career choices and life chances with their peers nationally. Young people who are care experienced are more likely to drop out of school, less likely to achieve formal qualifications and are less likely to go on to college or university – all through no fault of their own.
A cornerstone of MCR’s support is their ground breaking Mentoring programme, where adults from all walks of life are matched with a young person in secondary school locally. This young person might be in care or receiving support through Child Protection teams, live with family members with addiction challenges or have experience of bereavement. Each school makes sure that the young people who will benefit the most are invited to participate and each young person is participating by choice.
A Mentor helps the young person who is in or on the edges of the care system to explore what they enjoy, find out what they are or could be good at and think about what they want to do when they leave school. Mentors are asked to give 50 minutes a week of their time, school term time only, and full training and support are provided.
Susan is keen to tap into the many skills of the members of the Nine Incorporated Trades of Dundee to mentor and develop young persons in local secondary schools.
Mentoring can make an incredible difference to the lives of some of our most disadvantaged young people and helps close the attainment gap in our city. Please forward this to anyone who is interested in helping a young person find, grow and use their talents. This could be yourself or your company, or other individuals and organisations that you have links with. Please read the brochures attached, as you will understand why I am so enthusiastic about this initiative.
Deacon Convener Raymond Edwards
MCR Programme Information 2023 Long Term Benefits of MCR Mentoring