Acknowledgements:
We are grateful to:
· Sng Bee Bee, for writing the initial draft for this article
· John Tan, for leading the team of volunteers in planning and curating the TouchPoint sessions;
· Glenn Lim, Chairman of Mentoring Alliance Singapore, for motivating and supporting the volunteers and the dedicated team of volunteers who work hard on different aspects of the organisation of each session including publicity, technical support and writing of summaries of each session of which I’ve drawn the support materials for this article;
· Our team of volunteers to whom we are deeply appreciative: Ronald Ng (who played a pivotal role in the initial organisation of these TouchPoint sessions); Lee Han; Delia Pak; Stephen Ng; Cameron Tan, Yeo Wei Hong and Sng Bee Bee;
· Board Members of Mentoring Alliance Lim, Lim Wee-Lim and Ho Siew Cheong for their support of each TouchPoint session; and
· All the session speakers of TouchPoints for volunteering their time to share to very enthusiastic and earnest audiences at each session.
New Realities for Youth Mentoring
In recent years in Singapore, the topic of youth mentoring has been given increasing emphasis amid calls to address common issues such as academic stress, transitions, peer pressure and addiction to digital devices.
Foremost youth mentoring guru Professor Jean Rhodes (2020) in her book, ‘Older and Wiser - New Ideas for Youth Mentoring in the 21st Century’, argues that well-trained youth mentors can be as effective as professionals in supporting youth through the issues that they commonly face. She emphasizes, however, that for this to happen, these youth mentors need to be carefully trained and supervised. She presents a strong case to have “targeted, evidence-based models” (Rhodes, 2020, p. 30), explaining that her research data show that more targeted interventions yield more significant results.
Rhodes prescribes a model of youth mentoring which is based on three approaches, ‘specialized, embedded and blended mentoring’. The specialized approach offers targeted interventions based on specific issues and challenges faced by youth in the unique cultural contexts that they find themselves in. The embedded approach involves mentoring youth in their existing engagements and activities such as their academic studies, sports and other leisure activities. In the blended approach, she advocates a blended model of mentoring youth by harnessing the benefits of digital tools which can be used to match mentors and mentees; remind them of mentor sessions ad coach them. These digital tools can be combined with face-to-face support from the youth mentors. Jean Rhodes’ model of youth mentoring is captured in the table below, depicted in her book:
Source: Jean Rhodes (2020). Older and Wiser - New Ideas for Youth Mentoring in the 21st Century. Cambridge, Massachusetts, and London, England: Harvard University Press, p. 85.
Seeking to heed Rhodes’ advice and wanting to be on the right side of mentoring trends, Mentoring Alliance Singapore leaders realised the need to zoom in on the following areas:
The increase in the time that youths spend on their digital devices;
Youths’ emotions, and their interpretations of issues such as boredom, frustration, depression, as well as their respective domains being duly impacted such as their social relationships, family ties, and mental well-being;
The interventions needed for youth mentors to express care, challenge growth, provide support, share power, and expand possibilities etc.;
Adults building relationships of trust through youth mentoring thus providing safe spaces for youths to retreat to;
Challenging youth to take up action and reflection by championing positives and processing negatives in social media feeds; and
The realm of the digital world and the use of technology forging new norms in youth work, and the dire need for youth mentors to connect, relate, support, empower and facilitate changes in youths.
Keeping in Touch during Covid-19 Circuit-Breaker Lockdown
The Covid-19 pandemic’s appearance in early 2020 threw a spanner of sorts in the works. The practice of youth mentoring as traditionally conducted was disrupted, as were economies and life in general the whole world over. In Singapore, the government imposed heavy restrictions on physical gatherings in what was known as the Circuit Breaker Phase 1 and 2. This spanned a period from April to almost the end of 2020.
Mentoring Alliance shifted its mentor training and equipping sessions as well as its Community of Practice (CoP) gatherings, hitherto conducted in-person, to the online platform, namely, via Zoom. As the realities of safe-distancing and social isolation began to sink in, the idea of regularly gathering more frequently to keep in touch was floated. Hence the monthly TouchPoints series was birthed to address the pain-points, issues, and topics trending in youth mentoring amidst a Covid-stricken world.
The format of each TouchPoints session was designed to be clean and simple – invite a panel of speakers who have both passion and experience address a selected theme, followed by a question-and-answer segment. Before each session ended, participants were also invited to share their feedback and suggest topics for subsequent sessions.
The first TouchPoints, conducted April 2020, explored an existing model of youth mentoring practised by Mendaki. The session hosted by Mr Joe Chan, Head of Youth Services, REACH Community Services and Dr John Tan, ED of CARE Singapore, both members of the Mentoring Alliance steering committee, featured Mr Johann Johari, Assistant Director from Yayasan Mendaki, which has long been very active in the area of youth mentoring. Johann spoke about Mendaki’s mentoring philosophy that is based on a gift-centered approach and recognises youths as assets with tremendous potential to contribute to society.
Discussion and dialogue among participants during the initial April TouchPoints session also uncovered great interest and an urgent need for acquiring skills on the use of technology and digital tools to engage the youths of today - a demand accelerated by the pandemic.
This interest touched a common chord for those serving in the youth sector. A plan was then hatched to host the subsequent TouchPoints session, in May 2020, as a youth sector webinar. Mentoring Alliance then roped in the National Youth Council (NYC), the National Council of Social Service (NCSS), and the Youth Work Association Singapore (YWAS) as partners to promote the session, entitled “Engaging Youths Digitally.” Response was overwhelming. There were 1100 registrants and 750 attendees for the Saturday morning in May 2020. The panel featured four youth work veterans – Glenn Lim, Chairman of Mentoring Alliance; Kelvin Kong, founder of Voices of Asia; Chong Ee Jay, cyber-wellness expert from Focus on the Family; and Izhar Roslan, from RLA Foundation. The CEO of NYC, Mr David Chua, graced the occasion while John Tan was the panel moderator. It was evident that the ensuing pandemic, while creating anxiety, also offered new opportunities for engaging youths, not least of these, digital mentoring.
John Tan, also a board member of Mentoring Alliance, then reached out to participants at the session, to become regular TouchPoints volunteers to help plan and conduct future sessions. This call to action saw some twelve enthusiastic volunteers signing up. At the first volunteers briefing session, when John challenged the volunteers to suggest a theme for subsequent TouchPoint sessions, the topic of ‘Resilience’ was a resounding choice, being the most needed character trait to tide over the period of crisis. It then set the context theme for several of the other TouchPoint sessions from June 2020 onwards.
Resilience and TouchPoints
Over the years, there has been an evolution in the definition of the term ‘resilience’ from attention on the individual’s internal resources; capabilities, traits, characteristics and abilities to an ecological perspective that embodies both this individual’s internal potential and external factors such as external risk and protective factors (Luthar, 2000, pp.543-56 in Lee, 2010, pp. 437-53). Concurrently, there arises the argument that we also need to consider the cultures and diversity of youth in their coping behaviour in crisis resilience (Arrington and Wilson, 2000, 221-30; Ungar, 2004, 341-3 in Lee et al, 2010).
This transformation in perspectives on resilience means a shift to looking at how youth interact with their environment and draw upon the resources to maintain their mental health. The effectiveness with which youths achieve success in coping is also dependent on how they are socialized to view their mental well-being (Ungar, 2004 in Lee et al, 2010). Viewed in this light, it is equally crucial to study youth mentors’ perspectives of what constitute risks to youths’ mental well-being and how they are equipped to support and assist youth to overcome these risks during the Covid pandemic.
Cognizant of the literature and prevailing thinking on resilience, the TouchPoint sessions looked at resilience from both within an individual as well as the importance of external supports. The 2020 TouchPoints series then concluded with a discussion on using technology as an enabler.
2020 TouchPoints
The newly formed TouchPoints committee eagerly launched the Resilience series with a session in June 2020entitled “Bouncing Back: Fostering Resilience in Uncertain Times.” It featured a guest speaker from the other side of the continent – Ms Stacey Dakin from then known Canadian Mentoring Partnership (now named MENTOR Canada). Stacey shared how youths and mentors in her vast country coped with the pandemic, relying on relationships and staying in touch via digital means. The session’s panel also included long-time varsity educator Dr Sng Bee Bee (and TouchPoints volunteer) and her mentee, Andi Sumaryo, who shared what and how mentoring was like for them, through the years. From their sharing it was evident that mentors play an important role in modelling and inculcating resilience in their mentees.
July’s TouchPoints session, “Overcoming the Odds: Helping Youths Thrive” followed up with two interesting perspectives – firstly, from veteran psychologist, Dr Fred Toke, and the second, from entrepreneur-turned-mentor, Tony LoRe, who hails from downtown Los Angeles, USA. Both Toke and LoRe called for mentors to look beyond viewing youths as mere targets of intervention. Rather, it’s vital to help them recognise their respective latent strengths that will then open opportunities for them to realize their gifts and potential.
Toke emphasized that we should separate the person from the problem, by identifying the problem without labelling the individual. Instead of taking a negative spin and asking youths "What's wrong with you?", we should ask "What's right with you?" to validate their strengths. We can help youths find their purpose by guiding their discovery of passion and proficiency, along with accountability and discipline to work towards success.
LoRe, no stranger to Mentoring Alliance having keynoted at the inaugural Mentoring Summit in 2019, shared the concept of Sawubona, a Zulu greeting that means “I see you”. It reassures the receivers, in this case the mentees, of being accepted and encourages them to take ownership of their gifts within.
The TouchPoints session in August was a first of sorts for the Asian region. Mentoring Alliance through its Asian Center for Evidence-Based Mentoring (ACEBM) arm, hosted Professor Jean Rhodes from the MENTOR/UMB Center for Evidence-Based Mentoring.
The session featured the Asian book launch of Rhodes’ latest book, Older and Wiser. It was truly a rare treat for the audience to hear from, and ask questions of, a cutting-edge researcher and practitioner in the field of youth mentoring.
Drawing on more than thirty years of empirical research, Rhodes concludes that there is little evidence that most mentoring programs have been effective. But there is also much reason for hope as focused goals-setting and a skills-based approach create better outcomes. Plainly stated, the mentoring relationship should not just be a loving intervention, but should instead be a context for targeted based interventions. In addition, technology-delivered interventions (TDI) when implemented appropriately, can rival face-to-face interactions at lower costs, with many other benefits. Evidently, what is also necessary is for mentoring matches to be accompanied by supportive accountability and supervised mentor practice.
September’s TouchPoints moved the focus of resilience to the inner motivations of youths and young people. The session, titled “Growing From Within: Helping Youths Find Their Inner Drive” featured USA educator Brian Pickerd and Singaporean grassroots youth leader, Wong Jin Feng.
Pickerd discussed how we can find joy in being intentional in reaching out to the deeper needs of the youths we are responsible for. He also shared a practical template, aimed at developing a growth mindset in youths, that includes areas such as their abilities, skills, interests, and loves. He related stories of how he explored opportunities with his students, helping them grow from within.
Jin Feng believes that adults, instead of forcing a “correct” way of thinking in youths, should act as thinking guides. In order to connect with youths, we should understand them without presumptions, making sure instead to establish a context and purpose in order to foster effective collaboration with youths. In addition, Jin Feng highlighted that we can help youths by looking and listening, being available and present.
For October’s session The TouchPoints organising committee felt that attention should be paid to the needs of mentors and caregivers in general. Any form of care-giving or mentoring cannot be sustained without adequate self-care. In ahe session titled “Helping Yourself to Help Others” it invited Melissa Kwee, CEO of National Volunteer and Philanthropy Centre (NVPC), and psychologist Benedict Lim to present their views on how
Melissa shared how we can recognize our value as individuals while promoting community connectivity and care. She encouraged all to practise the four foundations of nutrition, rest, exercise and well-being. We should also set honest expectations, share our feelings and be human, and finally have a circle of accountability.
Benedict further expounded on why we should release what cannot be controlled and focus instead on what can be controlled. Importantly, we need to be aware of what we consume in terms of content and sources. It is essential to exercise healthy habits in the areas of the 4 Ms - mindset, mood, movement and meal.
The 2020 TouchPoints season concluded in November with the session “Harnessing Technology for Mentoring” where we heard from two young outstanding Asian leaders, Arundhuti Gupta and Kelvin Kong.
This session tackled the blended mentoring approach advocated by Jean Rhodes. Arundhuti, founder of Mentor Together in India, recommended that digital mentoring is necessary to improve social and intergenerational mobility. She feels that access to education alone is insufficient to help disadvantaged youths. They need additional connectors. Mentoring, particularly that which can be done remotely, promises to fill that gap.
A virtual mentoring platform enables greater access to digital interconnectivity and global networking. It can also be scaled more efficiently and allows a higher volume of mentor-mentee data to be processed, thereby reducing the obstacle of limited manpower. A digital mentoring platform provides greater flexibility and convenience to its users since it removes the usual challenges of urban living such as busy schedules and travelling time.
Kelvin, founder of Voices of Asia, based in Singapore, shared that technology-delivered interventions can be used to fill in existing gaps within the current mentoring field. Using an ecosystem concept allows for supply optimization and improved digital community engagement. Kelvin closed his sharing with the punchline: Program methodology drives, technology enables. Indeed, technology allows us to leverage the power of data to understand users and provide support in an efficient manner.
Reflections on TouchPoints 2020 Season
Having a wide range of speakers from different nationalities ranging from Canada, U.S.A, India and Singapore was crucial in providing a range of cross-cultural perspectives on the topic of youth mentoring. TouchPoints audiences appreciated the breadth of experiences and lessons being offered.
Typically after each session, the team of the TouchPoints volunteers, who comprise mainly young people, who organized the TouchPoint sessions stayed back to hold a debrief of the session. They were invited to provide their reflections and feedback on the sharing of each speaker. This enabled session speakers to obtain immediate input of how a young person may perceive and respond to what had been presented. It also served as a gesture of appreciation for the valuable insights that the speakers generously shared.
The foci of these TouchPoint sessions centred around helping youth identify and draw upon their inner resources in tiding through a crisis, harnessing the resources of evidence-based research and technology for mentoring youth and strategies of self-care for youth mentors. While 2020 will forever be remembered as the year of the pandemic, it may also be etched in memory as the year of opportunity, learning and resilience.
Returning to the definition of the term ‘resilience’ which encompasses both the individual’s internal resources and external perspective (Luthar, 2000, pp.543-56 in Lee, 2010, pp. 437-53), these TouchPoint sessions emphasize the perspectives of how youth interact with their environment and draw upon the resources to maintain their mental health.
Some Helpful Points to Ponder
Reflecting on the TouchPoint sessions in 2020 and moving forward to 2021, some helpful questions which youth mentors can ask are:
How can we design and curate a youth-led mentoring program in which youths take ownership of their mentoring journey, identify their own areas of needs for mentoring and work alongside with their mentors to chart their mentoring journey? This means empowering youths to take ownership of both their needs and growth journey as well as determine the targets of this mentoring journey. It will ultimately hone them to be future mentors being equipped to recognize the milestones of a mentoring journey and be better prepared to empathize with the young mentees.
How can we design a natural mentoring program involving youths in activities which are engaging, interesting and impactful? For instance, many youths are concerned about conservation of the environment and climate change. By roping them in nature conservation programs such as nature education walks, citizen science programs etc., they can learn the values of empathy, responsibility, adaptability and resilience – important qualities they can then apply in their own lives.
How can we harness the immerse benefits and reach of technology to mentor youths? This implies that youth mentors must pick up digital skills as well as pedagogical principles of online learning. Crises, such as the Covid pandemic that we are experiencing, surface the need to explore and fully utilize technology in all sectors of the economy, including youth mentoring. This necessitates a rigorous continuous training of youth mentors in digital skills so that the rhythm of mentoring will not be broken during a crisis.
How can we implement evidence-based research in curating a curriculum for youth mentoring? There is an immense amount of research on families and youth done by academics and research scholars in the universities in Singapore. How can we translate this research material into comprehensive and practical knowledge to equip and empower youth mentors?
How can we further develop and harness the resources of our international networks of youth mentoring and equipping organizations so that we share, exchange and motivate our knowledge, experiences and resources? How can we benefit from our cross-cultural knowledge and experiences to better equip our youth for a challenging future, in which we strive for improved social equality and mobility and respect for environment, nature and lives?
The Covid pandemic has caused us to pause and take stock of the crucial values in life such as the importance of family and other social relationships, the need for adaptability and resilience and consideration for disadvantaged, vulnerable and marginalized groups of people.
These issues, in themselves, can be a valuable resource and teaching points for us to equip our youth with the vital values to inculcate the character values, strengths and perspectives to live a worthy life that goes beyond mere materialism. It is hoped that the TouchPoint sessions for 2021 will further delve deeper and build on these values, thereby carving a better future for our youth and ourselves.
References
Arrington, E. G., & Wilson, M. N. (2000). A re-examination of risk and resilience during adolescence: Incorporating culture and diversity. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 9, 221-30 in Lee et al (2010).
Lee, T-Y, Kwong, W-M, Cheung, C-K, Ungar, M., Cheung, M. Y. L. (2010), Children's resilience-related beliefs as a predictor of positive child development in the face of adversities: Implications for interventions to enhance children's quality of life. Soc Indic Res 95:437-53, DOI 10.1007/S11205-009-9530-X.
Luthar, S. S., Cicchetti, D., & Becker, B. (2000). The construct of resilience: A critical evaluation and guidelines for future work. Child Development, 71, 543-56 in Lee et al (2010).
Rhodes J.E. (2020). Older and Wiser - New Ideas for Youth Mentoring in the 21st Century. Cambridge, Massachusetts, and London, England: Harvard University Press.
Ungar, M. (2004). A construction discourse on resilience: Multiple contexts, multiple realities among at-risk children and youth. Youth and Society, 35, 341-3.
Ungar, M., Brown, M., Liebenberg, L., Othman, R., Kwong, W. M, Armstrong, M., et al. (2007). Unique pathways to resilience across cultures. Adolescence, 42, 287-310 in Lee et al, 2010.
Ungar, M., Liebenberg, L., Boothroyd, R., Kwong, W. M., Lee, T. Y., Leblanc, J., et al. (2008). The study of youth resilience across cultures: Lessons from a pilot study of measurement development. Research in Human Development 5, 166-180 in Lee et al, 2010.
Our TouchPoint Volunteers
(L) The TouchPoints working committee with MASg leaders
(R) The TouchPoints committee at an appreciation meal