Mentors. First Steps in an Adult World

In 2014 the Dara Foundation, in partnership with the charitable organisation ‘A Child Should Live in a Family’, set up the ‘Mentors’ programme. It aims to help children deprived of parental care to discover their potential and adapt to independent life outside orphanages with the help of adult volunteer mentors. The programme is currently in operation in Almaty, Nur-sultan and four other regions: Karaganda, Pavlodar, Aktau and Uralsk.

Mentors become adult friends.

Every child needs personal attention, and the social and domestic skills that are best acquired within a family. It is clear that orphanages are state institutions with their own rules and standards, which is why children raised in them are often not ready for life outside the system by the time they are 16 to 17 years old. Adapting to the outside world is especially hard if there are no adults around to help them adjust by offering support and direction. Children in orphanages, growing up without feeling love, care and support from the people around them, can suffer delayed mental, physical, emotional, and social development. Many of them who leave without having any reliable ‘home front’, in the form of parents or guardians, can end up turning to crime. This is why the Dara Foundation set up Mentors.

Children past the age of 12 can take part in this programme, as they are old enough to understand the difference between a foster parent, parent, and mentor. Mentors can help children believe in themselves. They can help children develop confidence in their own strengths and offer the kind of support that teaches them to understand themselves better, identify their goals in life, and learn how to take responsibility for achieving them. Mentors become adult friends, able to use their own life experiences to be good listeners and to help the children through difficult situations. They can offer good advice, guide them through their career choices, and motivate them to achieve set goals.

Any adult older than 25 can be a mentor if they choose to. They need to be prepared to dedicate their time, share their knowledge, and become a close and important person to a child from an orphanage. The project coordinators and psychologists have set up a strict selection process for potential mentors. They check personal information, offer psychological tests and interview them to confirm that they are ready to take on this significant responsibility. Mentors then take part in a special two-day training session at a ‘mentors’ school’. They are taught important lessons about the distinctive psychology of children who have grown up in boarding school facilities, about their age-related requirements and personal boundaries, and they are also trained in emotional literacy. The project provides ongoing psychological support and accommodation for mentors and the children they are mentoring.

Initial meetings with children take place at orphanages, where the relationship develops. After all the necessary documents and paperwork have been completed, when the custodianship agency, the orphanage and the mentor have signed what is called the ‘guest agreement’, meetings can then take place outside the orphanage. This helps the children to be better prepared when they leave to enter real life, and with the support of their mentors they will learn the skills required to adapt.

Potential mentors should be prepared to engage in a serious and long-lasting relationship with the child they mentor. These relationships will last for a minimum of two years and take up a fair amount of time. It is important to understand that a mentor is not a sponsor, which is why expensive gifts and pocket money are not allowed. Mentors use communication to help children adapt to society and to acquire the skills needed for an independent life. They might cook together, go to the cinema or theatre, museums or the mountains, or be introduced to the mentors’ families and friends so that they can start to try

Mentors can help children believe in themselves.

out their new skills, show off their best qualities, have their questions answered and gain useful information.

Thanks to their participation in the programme, many children have improved their communication skills and relationships with other children of the same age, grown in self-confidence and developed a more positive attitude towards themselves. It has reduced the number of emotional and behavioural problems and improved exam results. If every child who left an orphanage had at least one caring adult, someone they could go to for support and advice in difficult situations, we as a society could be more confident that these children will be all right.

If you feel that you could positively influence the life of a child leaving an orphanage, if you could be flexible, patient and accept others the way they are, then join Mentors. Get in touch with our coordinators in your city and they can give you more details about our work.

• Almaty: +7 701 799 43 04, almaty@nastavniki.kz

• Nur-sultan: +7 771 244 49 39, astana@nastavniki.kz

• Karaganda: +7 747 940 33 28, karaganda@nastavniki.kz

• Pavlodar: +7 777 934 68 58, pavlodar@nastavniki.kz

• Uralsk: +7 775 135 57 26, uralsk@nastavniki.kz

• Aktau: +7 702 875 49 94, aktau@nastavniki.kz