California-Driven Research on Mentoring
The California Mentoring Partnership aims to advance a California-driven research agenda that supports evidence-based practice and demonstrates the benefits of mentoring.
CMP convened a California Mentoring Research Workgroup in 2013, in response to a recognition of a dearth of mentoring research based in California. The workgroup is comprised of CMP leaders, mentoring researchers, and practice leaders with an interest in research; we engage in substantive planning and discourse toward new mentoring research.
Workgroup leaders include:
- Dustianne North, Ph.D., M.S.W., Research Director, California Mentoring Partnership; Instructor and Research Consultant, University of California, Berkeley
- Todd Franke, Ph.D., M.S.W., Professor of Social Welfare, Associate Director of the Center for Healthier Children, Families and CommunitiesUniversity of California, Los Angeles
- Roger Jarjoura, Ph.D., Principal Researcher, American Institutes for Research, San Mateo, CA
Priorities for the research workgroup include:
- Design new outcomes-oriented research studies.
- Interpret and disseminate CMP and other research findings, to ensure that research informs practice.
- Connect researchers and studies to programs, youth, mentors, and practitioners who are interested in participating in research efforts.
- Convene quarterly discussions to promote cross-learning and discourse.
- Provide evaluation support and capacity-building resources to for mentoring programs.
Current workgroup activities:
- Preliminary study of adaptations mentoring programs are making in response to COVID, and the impact of these changes on youth and families, matches, and programs: a survey will be disseminated to the field in November 2020, and results and best practices recommendations are expected to be presented in January 2021.
- Building relationships with mentor programs across California who are interested to participate in new research studies as funds become available, in order to better position California researchers to take advantage of funding opportunities.
If you have a program that you would like to see featured in formal research on mentoring, please complete our brief survey, which will tell us more about your program as well as your interest and capacity for research. Completing this survey will add you to our “A-list” of programs to call on when research opportunities present.
Mentoring programs or practitioners, as well as researchers and supporters of mentoring who are interested in connecting with CMP regarding our research activities, are also invited to email our Research Director, Dustianne North, at at any time at research@camentoringpartnership.org
CMP Research Publications
The California Mentoring Research Workgroup administered and published reports from two California Mentoring Program Surveys, in 2015 and 2016, which captured timely snapshots of the California network of youth mentoring programs: numbers and locations of programs; numbers and demographics of youth served and mentors engaged; information about program models, special needs of youth served and specialized youth populations; program practices and needs for training and technical assistance. These publications are made available to the California mentoring field, to provide useful information as well as to support advocacy and fundraising efforts to advance any and all youth mentoring in our state.
The 2016 California Mentor Program Survey Report: designed, administered, analyzed in collaboration with MENTOR: The National Mentoring Partnership and CMP; infographic report published by CMP.
Download 2016 Survey ReportThe 2015 California Mentor Program Survey Report: designed, administered, analyzed and reported by CMP.
Download 2015 Survey Report
