President Obama Kicks Off National Mentoring Month

This year’s ninth annual National Mentoring Month, themed Expand Your Universe, Mentor a Child, focuses on developing ways to mobilize more community volunteers to mentor a young person and increasing knowledge about how mentoring can greatly enhance their prospects for leading a healthy and productive life. Research shows that mentoring has beneficial and long-term effects on youth by increasing their chances of high school graduation and college attendance and decreasing the likelihood of substance abuse and other risky behaviors.

In a proclamation recognizing the National Mentoring Month, President Obama praised mentors as key to fulfilling “critical local needs that often elude public services” and building a “brighter future for our Nation by helping our children grow into productive, engaged, and responsible adults.”