>> Workshops We Offer

MCG offers a wide variety of workshops and training sessions designed to meet the diverse needs of the mentoring community. Our workshops range from the basics of mentoring to the most cutting-edge strategies for serving difficult youth populations or creating innovative programming. All of our workshops are customized to meet the needs of our clients and provide the very latest in best practices and youth development theory. Among the workshops we offer:

Mentoring 101
This workshop teaches the nuts and bolts of running a quality program, regardless of setting. It also explores the specific nuances for serving your target population of youth and for recruiting and managing the volunteers you need. An excellent starting point for anyone looking to ground their program in proven, research-based best practices.

Male Mentor Recruitment
Do you have more women then men signing up for your program? Do you have more boys than girls on waiting lists? Are you struggling to get men in your community to rise to the challenge of mentoring? MCG takes participants through some of the best strategies to improve male recruitment. We will teach you how to capitalize on the single most important reason why a male volunteer will sign up for mentoring: another man asking him!

Corporate Involvement in Mentoring
What does it take for a business to establish a mentoring program with a local community agency or organization? MCG offers specific help in 9 major areas: 1) Getting buy in and total endorsement and involvement by top management; 2) Identification of a key employee to oversee and run the program with partners; 3) Securing of release time for employees to participate if applicable; 4) Samples of the complete application process and recruitment tools; 5) Screening procedures; 6) Mentor training; 7) Matching of mentors and youth; 8) Support and recognition for employees who sign up to be mentors; 9) Program evaluation.

Keeping Older Youth Engaged in Mentoring
Many mentoring programs begin by matching mentors and mentees in the early years with the ultimate goal of maintaining the relationship through high school graduation. This is particularly true with school-based initiatives.

While it is usually easy to keep youth engaged in the elementary years, it is often more challenging to do so as the youth get older. MCG offers ways to motivate high school age students and their mentors to "stay the long haul." This includes consideration of a shift from social to career mentoring and ideas for venue changes, frequency of visits, and other opportunities to ensure success during this critical time.

Supporting and Sustaining Mentors
It takes more than a recognition event at the end of a year of mentoring to keep mentors satisfied, motivated and willing to continue working with their mentee. What is the difference between a mentoring program that fizzles and dies and one that lasts over time? What role can teachers play in supporting mentors? What are some of the ways that program coordinators and liaisons can communicate regularly and effectively with mentors? These questions and more are answered in this workshop.

Diversifying Your Funding Strategies
If your program is dependent for more than 30% of your budget from one source than this workshop is for you. It is critical to explore how to diversify your fundraising from the very beginning of your program development. Fundraising needs to be considered in order to identify multiple resources and ensure the sustainability of your initiative.

What are the tools and tips for success? MCG will help you to identify at least six different kinds of fundraising sources and explore all the ways that you can reach each one of them.

Working with the Media
Covering the news, good or bad, is the job of a journalist. But mentoring programs need to know the keys to getting the "good news" out as often and accurately as possible. They also need to know how to handle crisis situations. Mentoring programs that have experienced a problem with the press know how important it is to be prepared at all times.

MCG will take you through the steps to nurture and handle the press effectively, including the importance of identifying a spokesperson for your organization, and many of the tips of the trade. What can be done to ensure that youth in mentoring programs are not labeled inappropriately and are represented well by the media are just two of the topics discussed.

Establishing Mentoring Programs for Native American Youth
MCG has worked with reservations and tribes around the country to develop mentoring programs using members of their community as mentors. This workshop takes participants through the process of establishing such an initiative on reservations, or in cities with substantial Native American populations. Of particular importance is the training component which encourages strategies to maintain the language, culture, and traditions of the mentees.