Warm Start to Brandeis Mentoring Program

The Brandeis Mentoring Program, now in its third year, kicked off last Friday afternoon. Students in fifth through eighth grade (mentors) are paired up with students in kindergarten through fourth grade and together they participate in activities and games. The eighth-grade members of the Mentoring Youth Board planned an afternoon of word search and match games designed for students to get to know one another. Mentors and mentees also created time capsules, cutting out images and words from magazines that symbolize their goals for the year and sealing them in envelopes to be opened at the end of the school year. This year, each mentoring day will be planned and organized by grade-level members of  the Mentoring Youth Board, a group of students who applied for and were selected to create a meaningful mentoring experience for all of the students in our school. 

"To me, a program like this bolsters a sense of responsibility and a sense of connectivity in our students," says Director of Middle School Dr. Sivan Tarle. "For our older students, in particular, they not only get to be a mentor to a younger student, but they also have an opportunity to be a little kid again. These are their final years at Brandeis, years when they are straddling the line between childhood and adolescence. By engaging in activities with younger students, they too get the opportunity to be a kid. Everyone walks away from these mentoring days happier." MORE PHOTOS