Copyright 2000 Susanne M. Alexander
MENTORING: BRIDGING THE GAPS
By Susanne M. Alexander

Gap.
An opening in a solid structure.
An interruption of continuity.
A conspicuous difference, imbalance or disparity.
A problematic situation resulting from such a disparity.

Mentor.
A wise and trusted counselor or teacher.

Bridging.
Providing passage over a gap.

Welfare reform and the use of prisons in place of drug and alcohol treatment have resulted in people attempting to connect to the community in record numbers. The challenges facing most of them include the need for job training, education, transportation and safe and affordable housing. The gap between where they start and where they need to end up can feel impossible to cross at the beginning. Most of them also need friends, a support system they can trust to provide coaching, and a non-judgmental place to vent and problem-solve. Within these relationships are gaps of culture, age, race, gender and experience.

Throughout the country, faith-based organizations such as InterAct Cleveland (formerly Eastside Interfaith Ministries, now InterReligious Partners in Action of Greater Cleveland) have begun to develop programs to meet the needs of this population. InterAct is counting on congregation members and others from throughout Greater Cleveland to step forward and participate, especially in mentoring individuals and families. It's an ever-evolving process with yet uncertain outcomes. Anecdotally, organizations are pointing to some successes, but the hard evidence of proof and statistics remains as a future outcome. Measuring the value of relationships, as well, is a soft issue probably too difficult to quantify.

A MENTORING TEAM

"Hiya sweetie!" Yvonne Pollard greets her mentor with a happy smile.

"Give me a hug." Mizz A. responds, holding her arms wide and pulling Pollard close.

"I'm so glad to see you," joins in Mizz Sue, part of the mentoring team.

In minutes, they are gathered closely at a table in a room next to the InterAct office and talking non-stop, sometimes all at the same time. Coincidentally, they are all color-coordinated in knit tops with blue patterns. At moments, they seem like any group of friends excited to be back together after not seeing each other for a few weeks. But the relationship is beyond friendship. Mizz A. rests her chin on her hand and gets serious quickly, asking Pollard, "How's your month been?" The response of "exciting, shocking, and depressing" provides enough questions and concerns to keep the conversation going for most of their monthly meeting hour together.

Dolores Acree, affectionately known as Mizz A., is a retired Cleveland schoolteacher, but she says that only partially prepared her for mentoring adults. For the past three years, she's been a mentor and teacher at InterAct, always looking for ways to help people "bridge the gap." Sometimes when Acree loses touch with a "mentee," or their problems are particularly difficult, she finds the gap is a tough one to bridge. Sometimes the love that builds fills her with joy. At 72, she knows her white curls are an outward sign of the wisdom life has taught her, and mentoring is a way to share it. "I'm a natural encourager," she says, although she admits she's learned the hard way to drop the word "should" from her advice and go with "May I offer a suggestion?"

Sue Pollitz, a resident of Cleveland Heights and part-time English teacher at Cleveland State University, teamed up as a mentor with Acree in March. InterAct uses two mentors for each mentee. At 64 and as a mother of four, Pollitz has some claim to experience herself. Faced with mentoring, however, she felt somewhat unsure of herself and her influence on Pollard. "It kind of frightened me," she says. "It was a serious responsibility, and I didn't want to do damage. After I talked to Dolores, however, I felt a lot better. I have confidence in her compassion and judgment." Her anxiety also dropped after meeting Pollard, who she describes as "warm and dynamic." She realized that in spite of some cultural differences, they had much in common as mothers and women.

The Collinwood Family Service Center referred Pollard to InterAct, located at Church of the Transfiguration at 86th and Euclid. They hoped InterAct could assist her with training and support before cash assistance is cut off in early 2001. With five children from ages 3 to 17 and only getting part-time agency assignments as a certified nursing assistant, she was glad for the help. She lives on E. 147th, a street with plentiful mud and trash. The wood on her porch is starting to rot, and she wants out of there badly. She is hoping for job training at Cuyahoga Community College, but she says she has struggled with communications at the Family Service Center in getting transportation and childcare vouchers.

It's tempting to package Pollard up as a cliché. African-American. Multiple children. Getting government assistance. But one of the first tasks a mentoring team faces is getting beyond stereotypes, to do some narrowing of the gap that separates them, and to better understand the mentee's world. Communication breakdowns and overcoming a lack of trust are common issues that arise early in most mentoring situations, and this one was no different. Pollard, now 33 with dark-rimmed glasses and a face-lighting smile, has been on her own since being kicked out of her home pregnant at age 15. She's divorced from the father of her other four children. She guards her privacy and isn't used to staying in touch with friends by telephone. When her mentors worry that they don't hear from her often enough, she reassures them that it is never personal that she hasn't called them much.

Repeated contact over the last 9 months has made a difference, especially between Acree and Pollard. They have passed the 6-month marker, a key length of time for making a difference. "I'm a very private person, but with Mizz A. I have to be truthful and honest," says Pollard. "She is one of the coolest older persons I've met. I love her honesty. It's a relief, because I can trust her. I'm not carrying the whole weight. I've been doing it alone since I was 15. I always took care of the problems and emergencies alone. I don't have a support system."

Acree and Pollitz animatedly counsel Pollard on job-hunting, cheer the news that she has stopped smoking, and encourage her efforts. Their faces crease in concern that her cash assistance will end in two months, and her wellbeing is uncertain. Their mutual worry about this threads through the meeting. It's clear that part of the relationship between the team members is spiritual. Pollard says it makes a difference for her that InterAct has a spiritual foundation, because she says beyond all the other assistance she needs, she needs spiritual guidance as well. She reads the Bible and other literature and gets to a Baptist church on some Sundays. She says Mizz A. and Mizz Sue encourage her to "pray, believe, hang on, and know God will only put on me so much as I can bear."

CHARITABLE CHOICE

The 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act contained a "Charitable Choice" provision that has allowed religious organizations to provide services under TANF regulations. This provision has set up an uneasy relationship between government and religious groups, historically operating on very separate tracks. While the government seemed to have some expectation that religious groups would rush in to fill the gap of connecting needy families closer to the community surrounding them, in fact religious groups have moved slowly and carefully into this field of service.

Trust is certainly a factor in the slow pace, but other factors come into play as well. The New York Times on October 17 stated many religious leaders were reluctant or unprepared to submit to the rigorous guidelines required to become government contractors. The Welfare Information Network, supported by grants and the US Department of Health and Human Services, says many faith-based organizations are already stretched thin, and not able to do more than they already are. Many congregations have also over time disengaged and distanced themselves from people in need. The provision also prohibits participating organizations from proselytizing their beliefs, but doesn't define the term, which can vary in common usage from a simple sharing of beliefs to forced conversion. For faith-based organizations that are culturally focused on sharing their beliefs and drawing in new members, this can be a deterrent.

Bill Raymond is president of FaithWorks Consulting Service and a social worker in Michigan for 28 years. He was former executive director of Good Samaritan Ministries in Holland, Michigan, one of the first faith-based organizations in the country to receive government funding under the provision to assist families. As organizations across the country started getting involved in similar projects, he was contacted frequently for advice, so he left Good Samaritan to set up a national consulting practice. He says, "The verdict is still out on faith-based initiatives. There's lots more research needed. The government made an early mistake in assuming that congregations would rush in to help and were ready to go. While some faith-based organizations were, others needed time to set up the necessary structure and leadership. The role of organizations like InterAct is important."

Raymond says volunteers need to understand that they are sharing, not just giving. They need to go into situations with a "servant attitude" intent on learning what it is like to be on government assistance, in poverty, coming out of institutions or homeless. They aren't there to solve problems and rescue, but rather to encourage and affirm the strength of the individuals. He says as volunteers engage, they discover that living on welfare doesn't go very far. Instead of speaking to them as if this is a problem, they can affirm the creativity and frugality that is allowing the family to stretch and make ends meet. "Volunteers get overly task oriented too soon, rather than treating it as a relationship," says Raymond. "Doing this and that doesn't guarantee happily ever after."

PROGRAM RE-STRUCTURED

During 2000, InterAct set up a Bridging-the-Gap program, which included eight weeks of life skills, job search and unpaid onsite work training. Upon graduation, the participants have been paired with mentors, although the agency has found it difficult at times to recruit enough volunteers. At the beginning of 2001, a new program called Partners-in-Action will take its place, although it will incorporate many of the features of the previous program. Just before Thanksgiving, the final Bridging-the-Gap class graduated.

The grads are a community of sorts, brought together by need and circumstance. Some of them will keep in touch, others will never see each other again, or just once in awhile at a crowded AA meeting. They are excited, nervous, in continuous motion, flitting between family members, counselors and each other, smiling and hamming it up for photos, sucking in stomachs and standing tall to show off good clothes they aren't used to wearing. They embrace each other and shake hands. Some aren't sure what's next, as there aren't enough mentors yet for everyone in their class, but they express trust in InterAct to sort it out. The room gets quiet when it's time for the blessing before the potluck lunch starts. Some get lumps in their throats when Jayme Shores, an Americorps*Vista member spending a year at InterAct, sings "Amazing Grace" in a clear, feminine voice.

They fill plates at the potluck tables, laden with turkey, yams, mashed potatoes, salads, and punch. An iced and decorated graduation cake waits on the side. When the line of eaters slows, the casual, but meaningful ceremony starts. Each graduate gives brief remarks, and there's talk about finishing something for the first time in their lives, their gratitude to God and program coordinator Mr. Willie Howard, the amazement of living without drugs and alcohol for the first time, feeling loved, feeling hope, feeling blessed. They hold their certificates up with proud smiles and are surrounded by enthusiastic applause.

Mizz A. talks about teaching the class about self-esteem and comments, "A teacher is always taught by her students. I'm so glad my path has crossed yours." Other mentors share that they are learning to give counsel without being bossy, learning from their mentees, dealing with the frustrations of sometimes difficult communications, praying for all they are in contact with and those who have dropped out. Some of them have been mentors off and on since the program started in 1997. The ceremony ends with rousing cheers and raucous clapping.

There is some sadness among the employees at InterAct at the end of the ceremony. Bridging-the-Gap has been a very successful program, and the future of the new Partners-in-Action program is an unknown quantity. InterAct has set up partnerships with Cleveland Works, Towards Employment, Interfaith Hospitality Network and New Life Community. The county has agreed with a request for operating funds to come from the state-sourced Prevention, Retention, and Contingency (PRC) funds for the program, and the final contract is in place awaiting the signature of the commissioners. Partner agency orientation meetings are also underway. Starting in 2001, these organizations will be responsible for whatever training is appropriate for their participants, and InterAct will pair eligible and willing ones with mentors.

Carolyn Cunningham, a volunteer coordinator at New Life Community, says they are looking forward to the collaboration. New Life, located at 3470 E. 152nd Street in Cleveland, offers transitional residences for homeless and jobless families for four months. They need a regular flow of mentor-partners for families who will provide emotional support and expand the families' ability to network in the community. "We empower those who come to us to do things for themselves, which raises their self-esteem and lowers the risk of them becoming homeless again," Cunningham said. "When they begin to feel good about themselves they in turn share what they've learned with their children. It's awesome to see the whole dynamics of the family change."

THE RECRUITING CHALLENGE

Raymond says in his consulting across the country, organizations are sharing with him that recruiting enough volunteers is the single biggest challenge they are experiencing in keeping mentoring programs going. "If I could find the magic formula, I'd package it and become a millionaire," he says. InterAct has been gradually developing a mentoring program since 1997. To-date, approximately 30 mentors have been trained and matched with mentees, who were referred to them from the county or community organizations.

InterAct has set a goal of training 232 mentors for 116 clients during 2001. Willie Howard and newly hired AaRon Jones will run the mentor training and coordinate the mentor-mentee teams during their yearlong commitment to each other. As Bridging-the-Gap coordinator during 2000, Howard has already been very involved in training and recruiting mentors, and his role will increase. "As I go out into the world I'm hoping to find people with a willingness and a commitment to help people who have not been as fortunate. As part of society and part of the world, we have to commit to working with and helping those who are less fortunate if we are going to improve on poverty and the situations of people coming from the penal system into the real world."

Partners-in-Action has as its mission to provide support in times of transition through mentors who can be friends, advocates, and role models, willing to listen and able to link their mentees with community resources with the help of InterAct staff. They can provide emotional support to their mentees to stay in jobs and to handle the sometimes conflicting responsibilities of work and family. All the while, staff and mentors assist the participants to explore their spirituality and connect with whatever faith is important to them. Volunteers in all of the partner agencies are instructed to not provide money for their mentees, but encouraged to simply focus on building relationships and connecting them to the resources they need. No one doubts that assisting these individuals and families is a tall order, but the people involved project passion and commitment.

Current program associate, Andy Lentz says that mentors will be recruited from a variety of sources, including from InterAct's diverse membership, which includes Bahá'í Faith, Christian, Jewish, Muslim, and Unitarian Universalist congregations. He says community-based organizations and corporations might also be willing to provide people. He sounds both confident and a bit concerned when he says, "We are looking for people who care about this issue and want to show their caring in this way and are willing to make a commitment."

MENTORING TRAINING

InterAct is actively searching for new quarters, and won't feel sorry to leave behind their tiny office shared by up to 12 people at a time. Mentor training currently takes place in the tiny Bridging-the-Gap classroom, around tables that fit together like pieces from different puzzles and equally mismatching plastic chairs. Blank-screened computers line the shelves and desks along the room's edge. A sticker on the wall says "Think Peace." Prospective mentors who participate, though, scarcely give these things a second look. They are there to be encouraged and reassured that they can handle this responsibility. At the end of the approximately six hours of training, most decide to stay.

Mike Periandri, Sr., a case manager at Cleveland Works, attended a training session in August and briefed a group including Willie Parker and Susan Benedict in dealing with ex-offenders. The upcoming Bridging-the-Gap graduating class included ex-offenders such as Derrick Cobb, their mentee, who had been incarcerated on drug charges. Periandri told them part of their role was to encourage Cobb to be straight with employers about both his past and his commitment to a changed life. "We tell them the biggest tool they have is honesty," asserts Periandri, who says mentors can be strong supports during the job interview and retention process.

The mentor-trainees are confronted by the thought of spending a year with someone with the experiences their mentees will have had. Howard, one of the trainers at the session, reassures them. "Be prepared to be good listeners and share their hurt and anger," he says. "They're looking for friends. They reach out to you, and hopefully you can receive them as well. Reassure them that everything they feel is okay. These people are willing and ready to move on to next step in their lives. "

Howard says, "One of the key issues around the training is getting across to the mentors that you are not expected to come into the meeting with the mentee knowing the answers to or having the solutions to their problems. You are learning from them as well. You are coming from two totally different cultures, you can get just as much from the mentees as far as knowledge about survival for them, as well as helping them put structure into their lives."

Mentors, who come from a diverse background of age, race, gender and experience, are not required to be professionals. They are fully supported by teams of people at the involved agencies. Any time they have a concern, they are encouraged to call. Mentees also often have counselors and/or Alcoholics Anonymous or Narcotics Anonymous sponsors. "You are not professionals. Don't fall into the trap of thinking you might be one," says Lentz, also leading the training. He reminds them that their time constraints are real as well. Teams sign a Covenant of Participation to be together for a year. Teams meet face-to-face once a month in a neutral location, often formally set up at InterAct with pizza, time for sharing and a speaker. Meetings are held around pushed-together tables in a yellow-walled room with orange and green carpet on the floor. In between meetings, teams attempt to be in contact with each other by telephone and sometimes participate in social or supportive activities together, like bowling, movies or sports games.

Howard says in his experience, mentees will often say they don't have much to share with their mentors, especially when they feel their lives have been very downhill. Mentors have to encourage the mentees, saying, 'Our purpose here is to rebuild, we want to help you, we're here for you, and we want to support you in your goals.' "Having failed so many times, people just don't have faith or belief that they can succeed again," says Howard. "Our job is to help and support them in saying, 'You can have more than you had before, you just have to start from the beginning and take one step, one day at a time, and you can achieve anything you want in life'." He says mentors are often in the role of offering encouragement when additional obstacles appear in the mentees' paths. Howard, himself, projects powerful faith in the participants and mentors, and they regularly acknowledge him for the difference he has made for them.

Once the partnership is connected, Howard says, "The satisfaction piece for me is to see the two working together and becoming friends and enjoying each other. They're very happy to do fun things together. Most of these people have to learn to trust again after so much has gone on in their lives. They've been abused mentally and physically, and to actually find someone who really cares about them...the trust thing is one of the major goals we try and build between the mentee and the mentor." He says the personalities on the teams are so different, staff at InterAct are often the link between the two for building relationships. "The mentees don't know how to build a relationship," he says. "Being adults, you would think it would be easy, but it's not. Being an adult, makes it even more difficult."

ANOTHER MENTORING TEAM

Willie Parker attends Derrick Cobb's graduation, and says he's looking forward to hearing what's going on with Cobb. Cobb's InterAct unpaid work experience has been at the Free Clinic, training to be a phlebotomist, and his supervisor is at graduation and publicly praises his skills. He did 147 draws of blood in the few weeks there, enough to qualify to take the national exam and be certified, although he later admits he won't pursue it, because he's "afraid of needles." He stands in front of the graduation crowd of about 80 people and grins and jokes easily about the women in the Clinic not being quite sure what to do with the four Bridging-the-Gap men there as trainees. Then he gets serious, saying, "Today I'm about change, about doing the right thing, taking the right paths."

Cobb was referred to InterAct from the Community Assessment Foundation (CAF), a therapeutic community center at 5163 Broadway in Cleveland for people with histories including alcohol and drug abuse and prison time. Cobb says he has been sober and straight for four years due to support programs in prison. CAF, team-counseled by Linda Heim and Butch Boone, has a behavior modification component, however. He credits this with giving him anger-management tools and helping him find a strong sense of inner serenity. His therapeutic community "family" members look to him as an example and turn to him for assistance with getting their lives together.

Benedict and Parker wanted to have a mentor-mentee meeting with Cobb soon after graduation, especially since a work commitment had caused Benedict to miss being at the graduation ceremony. She is an admissions coordinator for graduate studies at Case Western Reserve University. They meet on a warm evening in mid-September at the Church of the Covenant on Euclid in University Circle where Parker is employed. She's first to arrive and admits she has mixed feelings as she approaches this first meeting. "I'm excited and apprehensive," she says. "I'm not sure what I can do to help him. I do think it's important for people to have support, and people don't often get it." She wonders if she can be a boost to Cobb's self-esteem and share her experience gained from growing up with an alcoholic father and her challenges with job hunting. She says she knows what it's like to buy groceries with only $10 per week.

They meet in the basement area on black plastic chairs around a Formica table positioned next to the kitchen where Parker is food service manager for 93 kids in daycare at the church. It's a large room with squares of dark brown and rust linoleum. Parker pours out glasses of orange juice for them. The smell of citrus mingles with the lingering odor of cleaning fluid. Every noise echoes loudly, and makes them wonder about the level of sound in the room when the daycare is in session. The first team meeting is a bit awkward at the beginning, but they pull out the partnering covenant and a sheet to record Cobb's family, career, educational and personal goals, and the sharing begins.

Cobb is a tall man his friends at CAF refer to as a gentle giant, casual in red sweat pants and a black t-shirt. At 39, he has spent 11 of his adult years in prison. Out 22 months, he says he is tired of living in old ugly places and is focused on a change in attitude. He obtained his GED in prison, but isn't able to prove it to employers, as he is having difficulty obtaining the documentation. Never married, he still has fathered seven children, five girls and two boys between the ages of 10 and 18. Scattered around the country with different mothers, the lack of national coordination for child support payments leaves the women with inequitable child support being deducted from his paycheck. Cobb puts in 10-hour days at Mr. Heater putting control switches on kerosene heaters and stacking boxes on skids. The workday is long and tiring he says, but "I'm at peace. I don't have bad days, I just have bad moments."

"I don't know what to expect (from mentoring)," says Cobb. "I'll put my cards on the table and see what falls." He's looking to his mentors for help with family relationships. Recently Cobb's mother in Warren has asked him if he is getting high, and he is hurt by the question. He hopes Benedict, a parent where Parker is not, might give him some perspective on children, so he knows better how to talk to his own. "The trust is all gone. They have things to say, but they clam up, and I don't know how to bring it to the surface, how to make them comfortable," he says. "The girls ask outlandish questions, and have these attitudes and personalities...I seriously want to get through this." He's handling visitation and child support issues with the courts.

After CAF released Cobb, he moved with a friend from the program into a single family house on E. 78th Street with a "tall steel fence, not a white picket fence, but no barbed wire." He's enjoying the male friendship, something unique for him. He likes the noise of the city after the quiet of the prison. He still attends aftercare sessions with a goal to maintain recovery no matter what, and he hopes to become a chemical dependency counselor. "I'm going to change my path," he says, looking directly at his mentors and leaning forward for emphasis. "Today I know I have choices. I can accept things, walk away or deal with it. Today I choose to deal with it. I'm going to sit and be with God for a few months."

Benedict and Parker don't know each other except for a brief conversation at mentoring training, so they share a little of their histories with each other and Cobb. Both are in their early forties, quiet and a bit shy. Part of the task for the year will be how to build a relationship with each other. Parker is the lead mentor, so he will have more contact than Benedict will as backup. As a result, she isn't sure what she will actually be doing or what difference she will be able to make with Cobb. She sees brief openings to contribute to him during the evening session, such as explaining direct payroll deposit to him and warning him to be careful not to overuse bank machines. After the meeting, however, Benedict leaves Parker and Cobb in the basement, and walks out into the parking lot letting out a frustrated "I feel useless." It takes her weeks of trying to be in contact with Cobb by phone and not seeing him regularly to begin to insist on more contact and to have the confidence to make sure she is contributing.

Parker as well is learning patience. "Sometimes I feel like I want him to do this or that, but I have to realize he's a grown man, not a teenager," he says with a rueful laugh. In the first weeks of the relationship, Parker helps Cobb with getting ID so he can cash his paychecks, develops a budget with him, takes him out to see "Ladies' Man" at the movie theatre, and brings him to his church for a service. Cobb says Parker is often a spiritual guide for him. Parker says being around Cobb reminds him of being around his brother.

When life gets tough, Cobb says his Dad's words before he died of kidney failure are imbedded in him: "Don't ever give up!" "It's hard sometimes, but I'm the happiest I've ever been," he says. He credits the Bridging-the Gap program with helping him stay in Cleveland where he has had a better chance of success than returning home to Warren where there might be more temptations and trouble. "You're only as poor as you feel," he says. "I'm happy for what I've got. What I have is honest this time, not stolen, but given out of the kindness of people's hearts."

Volunteer application forms can be obtained at InterAct, AaRon Jones, InterAct Cleveland, 8614 Euclid Ave., 216-421-8560, pia@interactcleveland.org