Hartford Juvenile Mentoring Collaborative

OJJDP supports wide-ranging mentoring initiatives to reduce juvenile delinquency, gang involvement, academic failure, victimization, and school dropout rates. While mentoring is traditionally a volunteer-based service, a need exists for staff and resources to support the efforts of each mentoring program. Developing and maintaining mentoring partnerships and collaboratives can build capacity and increase the power of mentoring to benefit more young people. Local mentoring partnerships and collaboratives can bring together public and private sector leadership, eliminate duplication of efforts, fill service gaps, and offer centralized services. The successful award recipient(s) will fund a coordinator position to support a local continuum of mentoring services for targeted youth. This program is authorized by the Department of Justice Appropriations Act, 2012, Pub. L. No. 112-55, 125 Stat. 552, 617.

The Hartford Juvenile Mentoring Collaborative answers this call and invests in Hartford's youth creating a sustainable infrastructure to expand critical components of mentoring programs. This collaborative is a proposed project of The Governor's Prevention Partnership, in collaboration with the City of Hartford's Department of Families, Children, Youth, and Recreation; the Connecticut Judicial Branch, Court Support Services Division; and key mentoring service providers. The key providers include Nutmeg Big Brothers and Big Sisters, Klingberg Family Centers and the YMCA of Greater Hartford. The target population to be served is 375 at-risk youth, ages 10 to 17, and the proposed strategies include: (1) designing an infrastructure to manage accountability and improve access between mentoring programs, referral sources and other service providers; (2) utilizing research-based quality standards to increase capacity of mentoring programs; and, (3) developing specialized program offerings to increase positive outcomes.
CA/NCF