
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, October 7, 1995                   TAG: 9510090024
SECTION: CURRENT                    PAGE: NRV-3   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: NEW RIVER VALLEY BUREAU
DATELINE: PULASKI                                LENGTH: Medium

PROGRAM PAIRS AT-RISK YOUTHS WITH MENTORS

Pulaski's Juvenile Intervention Program will match 50 at-risk young people with adult volunteers to spend at least 10 hours a week with them and help them improve behavior and school performance, learn life skills and become better prepared for adulthood.

Applications for 10 participants from each grade from fifth to ninth as well as 50 adult mentors are being taken at the program office on the second floor of the Pulaski Municipal Building. The application deadline is Oct. 30.

The adult mentors will get a $500 stipend to defray time, travel and other costs. Activities with participating youths will include recreation, community service and other programs.

The "We Love Our Kids" project is being funded through a $17,540 grant secured through the state Drug Free Schools and Communities Act, and is aimed at helping youngsters at risk for drug abuse or delinquency. The town will provide a 10 percent in-kind match.

The town has not had a mentoring program or Big Brother/Big Sister program, but statistics gathered by its 3-year-old Juvenile Intervention Program show that one is needed.

Thirty-nine of the 215 cases referred to the Juvenile Intervention Program, a division of the town Police Department, recommended an adult mentor in their intervention plans. In 12 other cases, a young person or parent requested a mentor independent of the intervention plan, but none has been available until now.

Further support for a mentor project came from a Juvenile Intervention Program survey of middle and high school students in Pulaski County, in which 209 students responded that their parent was not a positive role model and 213 said they had no trusted adult in their lives.

Among the respondents, 62.1 percent reported some drug use or experimentation, 16 percent had been victims of violence, 30.4 percent had been involved in some kind of criminality, and 20.5 percent had run away or considered doing so as the only solution to their problems.

The mentoring program will provide guidance, information and motivation for participating young people. Applications and further information are available by calling Brenda Conner at 980-1000.

by CNB