My Mentoring Story (A Series by Friends for Youth Staff)

Rebecca’s Story.

No one says my name the way Tia Maria Elena does. She always stresses the second syllable more than most people and says it through a combination of her native Salvadorian accent, by way of French, spoken in English. And she always says it through laughter.

Though my aunt lives 3,000 miles away, it has never stopped her from being my mentor and lifelong friend. My Tia Maria Elena has always maintained that Canada’s cold winters are unbearable, and so she found a great way to survive. Most winters she would come stay with my family in California -- usually for a few months at a time. In those times I was her little sidekick. She liked to explore and go on adventures, and I just liked spending time with her. These were among the greatest memories of my childhood.

Growing up I was an only child, but when Tia Maria Elena would come visit, I always had a roommate. It was so much fun having her around. No matter the occasion we’d laugh our heads off. My dad always made jokes about how his sister could not stop herself from laughing, and despite his serious demeanor her laughter was contagious – even to him. She made everyone around her happier.

In May of 1990, accompanied by my family, I made my first trip to Canada for the celebration of my aunt’s wedding. My 10th birthday was a few days before the wedding, and I remember feeling so special when my aunt made a big to-do for my birthday – a birthday that I assumed would go uncelebrated with all the wedding festivities. I still have the cake top from that birthday celebration.

The following summer I returned to Canada, but this time on my own. It was the first of many solo trips to spend time with my aunt, along with my uncle and eventually my cousin. I was witness to my aunt’s love of gardening, cooking, and entertaining. She would let me help with tasks like growing dahlias, making quiche, and planning and executing parties; tasks that I continue to practice with the hope of one day mastering. During these summers together my aunt listened when I was at an age at which I felt no one was listening. She shared who she was and who she’d become, all the while helping me find my own path. Spending time with my aunt and her family and friends shaped who I am today.

The summer when I was 15 was another one spent in Canada. By this time my aunt had me learning French and loving it. She was so patient and encouraging as I totally botched my newest language. My aunt and her family took me on a driving trip through New England and introduced me to Boston. Three years later I enrolled at Boston University.

In college, every Thanksgiving, instead of making the long trip back to California, my aunt would insist that I come to Canada. She would cook a big American Thanksgiving just for me. This is significant because Canadian Thanksgiving is in October, so despite having already celebrated the holiday, my aunt would repeat the whole event. She’d even invite all my favorite people from past visits to join us at the table.

My aunt did not only teach me how to really laugh and have fun, but also how to have grace and fortitude in times of great sorrow. One might think that in times of tragedy there is no room for laughter, but in fact with my aunt there was. There was laughter and joy in recalling the best memories of those we’ve lost.

Last month my aunt came to visit – and of course stayed for a while – and brought a suitcase full of laughter! She was here to celebrate my wedding, and though her birthday fell the day before the party, I made sure her birthday wasn’t overlooked. Since there are so few birthdays we get to spend together, we’ve got to laugh it up and make the most of the ones we have.

Mentor Tip of the Week

Take a walk and watch some birds or planes.  Try the Baylands in Palo Alto or Coyote Point in San Mateo.  Have fun!

12th Annual Mentoring Conference Planning

Friends for Youth's Mentoring Institute is busy with final planning details for the 12th Annual Mentoring Conference, Share What You Know: Collaboration and Networking in Youth Mentoring. On Thursday, January 27, and Friday, January 28, 2011, youth mentoring professionals from around the country and the world gather together in Redwood Shores at the Oracle Conference Center to hear experts present their work in Best Practices, youth development, technology innovations, and with special populations.

How does the conference come to be what it is? I thought it might be interesting to give a behind-the-scenes tour of what goes into planning for the largest Friends for Youth annual event.

Starting immediately after the last conference, all staff gather together to debrief about what worked, what didn't, what would be good to try next year. This is an invaluable process and helps us deliver a smooth-running event that gets better each time. Everything from registration check-in to food to workshop topics is discussed and assessed for future conferences. Then, as the Program Director and coordinator of the conference, I spend a few months thinking about a theme, topics, keynote speakers. Starting in early summer, I begin to secure our sites. Oracle has been a generous Presenting Sponsor for the past six years, allowing us to use one day at their beautiful Oracle Conference Center. While we very much appreciate that we could never afford their incredible space, support, and catering without sponsorship, it does present a dilemma: where should we hold the first day of pre-conference courses? And where will attendees from out of town sleep? And why isn't there anything that fits these two needs within a mile of Oracle?

Thus, we often hold Thursday's sessions at another location that meets many criteria: close to Oracle, enough meeting room and guest sleeping room space, professional ambiance, and, most importantly, the lowest prices available for non-profit attendees! This process often takes several months and even several years to develop the best relationships with companies who can best meet our needs.

During this time, I'm working out the theme and contracting with our team of incredible designers from rise-and-shine studios in San Francisco. Once they deliver our graphics, I tackle all the other details: schedule, keynote and workshop presenters, topics, and descriptions. Save the Date announcements start during the summer, as many attendees have to plan their schedules and budgets far in advance of the actual conference. Herding presenters is sometimes a challenging process: with their own busy lives and responsibilities, it can take longer than anticipated to get all of the final details in place. I often go through a list of five or six possible keynote speakers before finding the one who is a good fit and can make the date!

Once we're at this point, D'Arcy, our web mistress extraordinaire, takes my plans for online information and registration and converts them into easy-to-use and accessible interfaces on our web site. Once we've tested and retested (and retested) to make sure there are no glitches in the process, I announce that registration is open and attendees start signing up! This does not mean, however, that my job is done: there's still more marketing, coordination, and decision-making that has to happen before the beginning of January. Not to mention designing and printing programs, ordering give-aways for attendees, making nametags, and organizing all the materials to go on site on the days of the conference.

Friends for Youth has an incredible staff who are always willing to pitch in and help with various tasks and provide an enormous amount of helpful feedback both before, during, and after the conference. Putting on the conference is truly a village effort!

I hope you'll consider joining us for two days in January to experience the results of nearly a year's worth of planning, developing, and implementing our vision of the second best way to create quality mentoring relationships for youth who need them most - by assisting more programs to develop safe and effective programs! See you at the conference!

Maribel's Mentoring Story

High School: many people love it and others hate it. In my experience, I would say I was right in the middle. Since I can remember I have always loved school and learning; however, high school I really didn’t care too much about. If it wasn’t for my friends and some wonderful teachers, I would have completely hated it. One of these wonderful teachers was my freshman year English teacher. Even though she was only my teacher for one year, she constantly checked on me through out my four years there.

Ms. Vasquez was more than a teacher to me; she was a friend. She encouraged me to challenge myself everyday, be that in school or life in general. She taught me to look at problems and challenges as learning experiences. One of my fondest memories was how she would, for periods of time, speak to me only in French, knowing that I didn’t speak or understand a word of French. The amazing thing was that by the end of my four years there I was able to understand almost everything she would say to me. Learning new languages doesn’t come naturally to me but I enjoy it; however writing has never been my cup of tea and back then I would stress over the fact that I was not writing as well as my peers. Ms. Vasquez was able to make me realize that I had plenty of other strengths, and not to worry about it if writing was not one of them. She would tell me to focus on my strengths and not to on my weaknesses. “No one is good at everything, but everyone is great at something.”

Kite Making 2010!

Last night, four Friendships came to the Friends for Youth offices to make their own kites! Friends for Youth provided some basic materials and a few designs, but the sky was the limit for these creatively curious kite makers.

Some chose to make simple designs that they then decorated with elaborate patterns or garish announcements (for example: "Go Giants!"), while others focused on crafting a strong kite from a more complicated design.

And, as indicated by the picture, a few of the kites doubled well as surprisingly stylish hats!

The 4th Annual Friends for Youth Fashion Show

This winter's Friends for Youth Fashion Show will be held on Saturday, December 4th from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Nordstrom in Palo Alto. The show features a silent auction, a champagne brunch and, of course, the wonderful fashion show hosted by Norstrom's own Personal Touch Director.

Friends for Youth has hosted the fashion show now for four years. It has become an exceptional way to kick off the holiday giving season for the Peninsula's fashionably inclined. The silent auction features tasteful gifts that are already wrapped and ready for holiday giving, and the fashion show provides all kind of chic ideas for gifting shoppers.

Reserve your place at this enjoyable morning event today!

My Mentoring Story (A Series by Friends for Youth Staff)

My earliest mentor was an artist named Esme Bradberry who lived up the street from my family. She would open her tiny studio in her backyard to a few neighborhood kids and let us do whatever we wanted. Esme gave a few pointers and demonstrated some techniques, but for project ideas, she let us take the lead, offering only words of encouragement. My mom and dad still have some of my art from that time: painted plaster casts of toothpaste tubes inscribed with Silly String, glazed ceramic containers with no practical purpose, and many, many painted pet rocks. Later, in middle and high school, I was taught art by Karen DeMichael, an artist and art teacher, who continued to provide a guiding framework (sometimes quite literally) and let me be creative. Struggling with social relationships during that time, I found solace in the art room and with her open and accepting approach for everyone who want to make art. I also found comfort from her personal connection to me and support of my creativity.

Bay Area author and filmmaker Phil Cousineau, a keynote speaker at Friends for Youth's 2006 annual mentoring conference, describes mentors as "mind-makers," those who help others decide for themselves their path in life. This differentiates mentors from parents, teachers, relatives, and peers who each have important, specific roles and responsibilities of their own. One specific experience with Karen made it clear she was really a mentor and not just a teacher or even like a parent to me. For my senior year Advanced Placement Art portfolio, she let me pursue a project that, in hindsight, was pretty awful, lacking creativity and leaving the impression that I hadn't learned anything in that class. I did not receive AP credit for that class solely because of that project but she never told me I couldn't do it. She tried to work with me to add to it, change it, embellish it in some way to make it a better representation of my talents, but, in the end, let me do it my way. My parents, however, were concerned about my performance in all classes and I'm sure part of why I wanted to carry on was because of their response.

These experiences with Esme and Karen had many impacts on me, influencing my choice of career as an artist and art therapist, my belief in the power of creative expression, and my strong support of mentoring young people. I know that I must pass it on, helping another young person know that he or she can go from a ceramic cup (pictured above, circa 1979) to the Mentoring Journal with encouragement, education, practice, and support!

The 23rd Annual Peninsula Golf Challenge

After months of tireless organizing, planning, gathering, boxing, and preparing, Friends for Youth hosted the 23rd Annual Peninsula Golf Challenge at Sharon Heights Golf Course on Monday, October 4th.

Over 100 golfers showed up to support Friends for Youth. More than 15 volunteers assisted in the day's festivities. And although the day started cold and cloudy, by early afternoon the sun had come out to stay.

As in years past, the charity tournament was hosted by Hooked on Golf's Mitch Juricich. Mitch oversaw favorite activities like the Deck of Cards Raffle, the Live Auction and individual pledges. Separately, four volunteer Friendships did their own bit of fund-raising for Friends for Youth, selling prize balloons to the golfing guests. This is a perennial favorite, since each customer must to pop his or her balloon to discover the prize inside!

After a steak dinner, silent and live auctions, speeches by Junior Friends and Executive Director Becky Cooper, and final golf tournament prizes, the daylong festivities came to a successful end. Now we all just have to wait for next year!