Local kids organization will soon be put to test

Affiliate of Big Brothers Big Sisters chosen for nationwide mentoring study

The local affiliate of Big Brothers Big Sisters has been selected to participate in a nationwide study that will evaluate the benefits of the organization’s mentoring of youth in a variety of areas, including school performance, mental health and the avoidance of risky behaviors.

The study will build on previous research efforts that monitored the effectiveness of mentoring provided by Big Brothers Big Sisters. The nonprofit’s Mountain Region serves about 1,150 children throughout New Mexico, and is one of just 17 of the organization’s national outlets to play a part in the project.

“We are really pleased to be selected,” said Andrea Fisher Maril, the Mountain Region’s CEO.

She said one of the last major research projects to determine the benefits of mentoring children was in 1979.

“A really good research project will show the 1979 study wasn’t just a fluke; that mentoring really works,” Fisher Maril said in an interview Monday. “If it shows mentoring works, then, when we go to the [New Mexico] Children, Youth and Families Department to ask for funding, or when we go to other funders, it makes a difference.

“I’m not saying we don’t have great personal stories. We can cite those forever. But beyond stories, we can show mentoring the way a national organization does it works well. The flip side is, it may reveal if there are problems. But if it does, it gives us a chance to say, ‘This is what we can do better.’ ”

In Santa Fe County, Fisher Maril said about 307 children participate in Big Brothers Big Sisters. The Mountain Region encompasses a variety of areas in the state, including Los Alamos, Rio Arriba, Santa Fe, Taos, San Miguel and Mora counties.

Big Brothers Big Sisters provides one-onone mentoring, generally between an adult — though high school students can sometimes play a role — and a child, Fisher Maril said. “It’s a chance,” she said, “to show kids a way of life they might not have seen.”

The national Big Brothers Big Sisters will begin the study early next year.

“As important as that study was, there is a pressing need to understand the present-day benefits of the program and to see if these are lasting over time, which is something the original study did not do,” Dr. David DuBois, a lead researcher in the study and a professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, said in a news release.

Called the “Youth Relationships Study” by Big Brothers Big Sisters, the effort will encompass about 2,500 young people between the ages of 10 and 16 nationally.