Janis Kupersmidt Receives a William T. Grant Research Award

December 18, 2017 New York, NY–The William T. Grant Foundation is pleased to announce that Janis Kupersmidt, innovation Research & Training, Jean E. Rhodes, Dept. of Psychology, University of Massachusetts Boston, Sarah Schwartz, Dept. of Psychology, Suffolk University, and Renee Spencer, Dept. of Human Behavior, School of Social Work, Boston University, received a Research Award under the Foundation’s Reducing Inequality focus area. This grant funds high quality, empirical projects that examine programs, policies, and practices that can reduce inequality among young people in the U.S. Their three-year grant is in the amount of $582,150.

“I am excited about this study and am hopeful that leveraging a mentoring intervention will help to improve academic outcomes for racial/ethnic minorities and low-income college students” said Adam Gamoran, President of the Foundation.

For more information, see the William T. Grant Foundation.

Dr. Kupersmidt to Meet with Enrollment and Match Support Specialists at Big Brothers Big Sisters of Moscow

November 14, 2017 – Dr. Janis Kupersmidt, President and Senior Research Scientist at iRT and Mentoring Central, met with mentoring program staff in Moscow at the office of Big Brothers Big Sisters. Dr. Kupersmidt presented findings from iRT’s research on their online mentee training program, Building the Foundation for Mentees, and online parent/guardian training, Building the Foundation for Parents. In addition, she responded to questions about match support, supporting mentoring relationships with youth in foster care, the importance of training mentors on the ethical code for mentoring, staff training, and the Elements of Effective Practice for Mentoring.

Dr. Kupersmidt to be a Keynote Speaker at Russia’s First International Mentoring Conference

November 13, 2017 – Dr. Janis Kupersmidt, President and Senior Research Scientist at iRT and Mentoring Central, will be the keynote speaker at Global Mentori , Russia’s First International Mentoring Conference. The conference will take place November 13th-14th in Moscow. The theme of the conference is “Evaluation of the Effectiveness of Mentoring”, and will feature speakers from throughout Europe and the world. Dr. Kupersmidt will present findings from her latest research projects on how mentoring programs can implement practices that can improve match and youth outcomes. In addition, her collaborator, Dr. Jean Rhodes, Director of the Center for Evidence-Based Mentoring at the University of Massachusetts Boston, will present an overview of the status of mentoring in the U.S. in a previously recorded video. For more information, see https://global.mentori.ru/2017/speakers/.

Dr. Kupersmidt to Speak in the Netherlands about Latest Research News about Youth Mentoring

November 9, 2017 – Dr. Janis Kupersmidt, iRT’s and Mentoring Central’s President and Senior Research Scientist, and Eline Heppe, doctoral student at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam, presented at the Center of Expertise Social Innovation, Rotterdam University of Applied Sciences, on “Increasing the Effectiveness of Mentoring by Enhancing Mentoring Program Practices”. Rotterdam University has partnered with local high schools and primary schools to develop mentoring relationships between the university’s students and youth from South Rotterdam, an area of the city with a high percentage of dropouts and youth unemployment. The audience for this presentation included a diverse group of representatives from mentoring programs across Rotterdam, including Big Brothers Big Sisters or Rotterdam, researchers, city government officials and funders providing support to mentoring activities in Rotterdam. iRT is excited about working with mentoring organizations across the globe to help them increase their impact on the youth they serve. For more information about Mentors of Rotterdam and the work of the Centre of Expertise Innovation, see https://www.emiopzuid.nl/info-729/mentors-of-rotterdam.

Dr. Kupersmidt Meeting with Research Collaborators at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam

November 8, 2017 – Dr. Janis Kupersmidt, President and Senior Research Scientist at iRT and Mentoring Central, met with her protégé and collaborator, Eline Heppe, doctoral student at the Vrije Universiteit (VU) in Amsterdam, to work on research projects related to mentoring adolescents and youth adults with visual impairment. Dr. Kupersmidt also had the honor of working with collaborators at the (VU) who are also Eline’s faculty advisors, Dr. Sabina Kef, Assistant Professor of Clinical Child and Family Studies , and Dr. Carlo Schuengel, Professor of Clinical Child and Family Studies and Associate Dean for Research in the Faculty of Behavioural and Movement Sciences.

EEPM Adherence and High Quality Mentor Training Increase Match Length

Mentoring programs vary greatly in their adherence to the high quality safety- and research-based benchmark practices described in the Elements of Effective Practice for Mentoring (EEPM; published by MENTOR/National Mentoring Partnership). These benchmark program practices are designed as guidelines that enable mentoring programs to better prepare and support mentors, mentees, and mentee’s parents throughout the mentoring relationship. The EEPM is composed of six Standards that are organized around the life cycle of a mentoring relationship beginning with recruitment of match members, and continuing through screening, training, matching mentors with mentees and initiating the relationship, monitoring and support, and relationship closure. Despite the fact that these guidelines were written based upon an extensive review of the scientific literature on mentoring and consultation with program practitioners and technical assistance experts, it was not known whether greater adherence to the EEPM would have a measurable impact on mentoring relationships. A recently published study in the Journal of Community Psychology concluded, “Yes!” Read more »

Innovation Research & Training (iRT) Participates in International Short Course on Mentoring

Boston, Massachusetts

On October 4th and 5th, iRT Senior Research Scientist, Dr. Janis Kupersmidt, participated in the Short Course on Strengthening Mentoring Program Quality to Broaden Impact sponsored by The University of Massachusetts-Boston, MENTOR, the European Centers for Evidence-Based Mentoring, and Mass Mentoring.

Dr. Kupersmidt gave a presentation entitled, “Increasing Youth Outcomes by Enhancing Mentoring Program Practices”. The presentation focused on how mentoring programs can provide high-quality, effective services uniformly to all youth served by the program. Mentoring programs should focus on implementation of program practice guidelines described in the Elements of Effective Practice for Mentoring (EEPM) published by MENTOR/National Mentoring Partnership, and the use of research-informed and safety-oriented training for mentors, mentees, and the parents or guardians of mentees. The presentation included a summary of research conducted by Dr. Kupersmidt and her colleagues on the positive outcomes associated with greater adherence to the program practice benchmarks described in the EEPM.

Dr. Kupersmidt also discussed results of recent iRT research on practices that improve the quality of mentoring programs for children in foster care and children of incarcerated parents, as well as the impact of matching practices on the length and strength of mentoring relationships.

This event hosted experts in mentoring from across the world, including the United States, the Netherlands, Germany, and Spain. Interest in youth mentoring is expanding quickly across Europe, and leading experts are interested in collecting the best information on how to create programs that have the biggest positive impact on youth. Attendees of the event discussed various program models and practices, and explored different approaches to youth mentoring. Earlier this year, a similar short course was conducted in Leeuwarden, the Netherlands building on the European Mentoring Summit program. The next European Mentoring Summit will be held in Berlin, Germany, March 14-16, 2018.