SOUTHEAST STUDENTS MENTOR 'AT RISK' YOUTH

Three Southeast Missouri State University students served as mentors last fall for a group of at-risk sixth graders in Jackson.

Criminal justice majors, Perry Save of Long Beach, Calif., and Carlos DeJesus of South Gate, Calif., and social work major, Anne Stukenberg of Mascoutah, Ill., mentored 15 "at risk" sixth grade students at Jackson Middle School as part of an independent study at Southeast and the Jackson R-2 Pilot Tutoring Program.

The students met every Tuesday and Thursday after school for eight weeks during the fall semester to help the sixth grade students with homework and to counsel them on disciplinary problems they were having at school.

Jason Bruns, one of the teachers at Jackson Middle School who supervises the program, said that working with the University students boosted the sixth graders' motivation 100 percent during the week.

The sixth graders accumulate points at every mentoring session to motivate them to make progress in school through a reward system. Those students who accumulate enough points by showing moderate to high levels of participation and effort are rewarded with monthly and end-of-the-year activities, such as going to a Southeast Missouri State basketball game with their mentor or going to a St. Louis Cardinal game.

The students receiving the mentoring were identified by their fifth and sixth grade teachers as being at risk for becoming juvenile delinquents. These students had poor attendance, attitudinal and disciplinary problems, and turned in school assignments late. The goals of the mentoring program were to motivate them to stay in school and to instill in them a desire to learn, decrease their disciplinary problems and improve their grades.

Linda Ferrell, an instructor in Southeast's Department of Criminal Justice, made a presentation about the statistical results of the mentoring program to the Jackson school board Jan. 25.

The meeting ended with a standing ovation for Southeast students, she said, adding that she informed the board that the program improved students' attitudes toward school and learning as noted in weekly teacher evaluations. The students also had fewer disciplinary referrals and absences, and a higher grade point average in the second quarter when the mentoring took place, Ferrell said.

"It was really rewarding to see at-risk students making progress and having their self-esteem lifted," she said.

Dr. Kenneth Dobbins, president of Southeast Missouri State University, says the mentoring program for at-risk Jackson youths exemplifies the University fulfilling its service mission to the region.

"One of the goals of our strategic plan is for Southeast to serve as a leader in developing productive partnerships with other regional entities to meet the educational and other needs of the region" Dobbins said. "Our strategic plan also calls for each of our academic programs to have a built-in experiential learning component in its curriculum so that meaningful experiential learning will be a part of the education of all of our graduates. This mentoring program goes a long way towards furthering both of these goals."