Hey Mentors! You are AMAZING, and we want to know how to support you best! From everything you tell us, the Coffee Talks are “really important,” “so helpful.”

However, the past 3 months we have had a steady decline in attendance with only three folks in July and one in August. We want to be sure that this is a service that still fulfills the original desire of our mentors: to have time with other mentors to learn and share ideas and tips on mentoring.  Please take a few minutes to complete an anonymous survey that will help us create the mentor support YOU want.

We will be assembling the data from this survey in December and deciding whether to resume the Coffee Talks. Please take the survey by NOVEMBER 30th.

Thanks!

Go here: Coffee Talk Survey

More mini-golfing fun for a good cause!

Due to the generosity of Rocky Mountain Mini-golf and the rain-out of this past Saturday’s “Glow-in-the-Dark Mini-golfing,” the offer below has been extended through Saturday night September 19th! Come out and support the Chaffee County Mentors while having fun! We are grateful to Rocky Mountain Mini-golf and to the support of the community. We know many of you were excited to join us for the Glow-in-the-Dark party this past Saturday until the storm clouds stole our thunder!

SPECIAL OFFER: Rocky Mountain Mini-Golf is graciously donating 50% of all admission charges to the Mentors Program.

DATES: Tues., 9/15 through Sat. night, 9/19

TIME: 10am-9pm

LOCATION: Rocky Mountain Mini-Golf, located on Hwy 50 in Salida, next to Country Bounty Restaurant

YOU MUST MENTION THE MENTORS PROGRAM

MENTOR MATCHES GOLF FOR FREE!!! So just grab a few folks to come along and make it a fun family outing! Tell your neighbors, your family and your friends tell EVERYONE to come out!

Please feel free to contact us with any questions: 539-2630 or Rocky Mountain Mini-Golf: 539-3140

Project Education Sudan coming to Salida - A Great Opportunity to Share

Here is a great opportunity for YOU and your Buddy to make a difference and have a good time doing it! Join Salida Circus’s “Walk for Project Sudan.”  Jen Dempsey, ringleader of the Salida Circus, says, “Whether you raise $2 or $200 we want you to join us for the walk and support these amazing people!”

Below is more information on the Walk.  Also check out the these fantastic educational events and unique cultural experiences to do with your match:

From the Salida Circus website:

PES (Project Education Sudan) events in Salida

The Salida Circus, The Convergence Project and the Colorado Central Humanists will be hosting a series of events about the Lost Boys and Girls of Sudan from Sept 10-13th. PES founders Carol-Francis Rinehart, Isaac Khor Bher and Daniel Majok Gai will be in Salida to share their stories. We hope to see everyone at the following events:

• From August 28th to September 13th, 2009 – Project Education Sudan Photo Exhibit at Salida Library
• Thursday September 10th, 2009 – 7 PM – “God Grew Tired of Us” Film – Salida Community Center.
• Friday September 11th, 2009 – 2 PM – Daniel Gai speaks at Salida Middle School
• Saturday September 12th, 2009 – 2 PM – Salida Circus Walk for PES; meet at Riverside Park 1:30 PM
• Sunday September 13th, 2009 – 3 PM – Daniel Gai, Isaac Khor Bher and Carol Rinehart from PES will give presentation at the Salida Library. 7 PM – “One Story: Isaac Khor Bher” Film – Open Channel Studio, Sandusky Building , 223 F Street. Isaac Khor Bher will be available to answer questions following the film. FREE & OPEN TO THE PUBLIC!

And this is what the website has to say about the Walk for Project Sudan:

On Saturday September 12th, 2009 the Salida Circus will join other Salida folks for a circus walk to raise funds for Project Education Sudan (PES).PES is a Denver-based 501(c)(3) non-profit founded in 2005. A partnership of Sudanese and Americans, PES was formed in response to the destruction that resulted from the 21-year civil war between northern and southern Sudan.

PES mission is to raise funds and support for indigenous Sudanese organizations and communities that build primary and secondary schools, and to train teachers in rural villages in southern Sudan. PES began by reuniting Lost Boys with their families in 2005, which led to working with community leaders and elders in their home villages. Lost Boys, Daniel Majok Gai, Panther Abuk Kuol and Isaac Khor Bher are on the board of directors. Isaac Khor Bher and Carol Rinehart are co-founders of PES. The young men work through PES to give back to their homeland by bringing education to the children and undereducated adults in their villages.

All monies raised from the Salida Circus Walk will go towards building the Pagook Secondary Coed School in Daniel Majok Gai’s village of Pagook, southern Sudan. To learn more about PES and to view photos of their projects in Sudan go to www.ProjectEducationSudan.org

Anyone interested in joining in the Circus Walk should fill out the pledge form below and arrive at Riverside Park at 1:30 PM on September 12th, 2009. All participants – stiltwalkers, unicyclists, jugglers, tumblers, ordinary walkers – should arrive with pledge forms and donations in an envelope to be collected before the walk.

Walking rain or shine! If you can’t make the walk but would like to support PES, please fill out the pledge form and send donation to:
Salida Circus 140 N. C Street , Salida 81201

Come out and support the Chaffee County Mentors while having fun. This Saturday, August 8 Rocky Mountain Mini-Golf is kindly donating 50 percent of all admission charges to the Mentors Program. On Saturday from 10am-9pm – ALL DAY – when a customer (anyone who comes into play golf that day) mentions the Mentors Program, half of what they pay will go to CCM! Wow!

Rocky Mountain Mini-Golf, located on Hwy 50 in Salida, next to Country Bounty Restaurant, has been a big supporter of the Mentors Program.  So make sure to thank them by playing mini-golf there! Tell your neighbors, your family and your friends to come out! Heck, tell the postal service workers, grocery cashiers and librarians too!  Make sure they know that they have to say they are there to help out the Mentors Program! What a great way to spend time having fun in the sun!

Come and Play

What a blast! Saturday, July 11th was our Mt. Princeton Hot Springs activity. After 2 hours of swimming, soaking, sliding, splishing and splashing, the vote was unanimously in favor of making this an ANNUAL Mentors activity! We arrived early enough to be there before the public and had the 2 large pools, hot tub, one cold pool, and the slide all to ourselves.  The water slide was the highlight, of course! Mentees and mentors alike tried all sorts of different sliding “styles”: single, double, triple, even quadruple! Some went backwards sitting up, or backwards lying down. Some pairs tried sitting face to face on their mat tea-party style (which was really exciting for the person going down backwards!). What an adventurous group! If you didn’t come with us, we missed you - make sure to keep your eyes open for this event next summer.  We are incredibly grateful to Mt. Princeton for making this event possible!

I took a workshop called “Substance Abuse Prevention Specialist Training” during the first week in May. This 4-day training was full of information and tools on how to work to keep kids safe in a culture that is riddled with substance abuse. Intentional media targeting of youth with alcohol and tobacco advertising was one of the topics we discussed. Research shows that kids are very susceptible to advertising and images that they see portraying products of all kinds.

Whether it is the latest gadget, sugary cereal or shiny toy – statistics show that kids are the most successful group to target with advertising. And this is no different for tobacco and alcohol marketing. According to the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids, the tobacco industry spends more than 8.4 billion dollars a year on advertising (that breaks down to $23 million per day!).

So how do we protect our kids from the strong pull of suggestive selling of tobacco products (and alcohol products as well for that matter) with posters and items purposely placed at their eye level (one of the current tobacco and alcohol marketing techniques)? This is exactly what our local Boys and Girls Club “Get R!EAL” coalition is working to address in the Salida community.  I attended the Salida City Council meeting last Tuesday evening.  Seven girls in black t-shirts displaying the “Get R!EAL” logo filled the front row. They were an impressive presence. Every person attending the meeting was given the option of wearing a purple sticker that read, “I care about Salida youth. I support a tobacco product placement ordinance in Salida.”

This ordinance has 3 elements: 1) Tobacco products would be placed out of reach of minors and behind the sales counter so that individuals must ask for the product they need; 2) Vending machines could only be placed where minors would not have access to them; 3) Merchants and companies could not give away free tobacco products in a promotional manner (at festivals, events, etc.). This ordinance is going before the City Council on June 2^nd to be put to a vote.  The Get R!EAL coalition has been working diligently for months at the Boys and Girls Club and with businesses and local municipal government in a responsible and inclusive way, making sure that this is not a divisive situation that could put small business owners at risk during these tough economic times.

If you would like to show your support for this ordinance, the next meeting will be held June 2^nd, at 6pm at Salida City Council (on 3^rd Street between F and E Streets). Let’s hear it for the good work of our local youth to keep themselves and each other healthy and tobacco-free!

There really is nothing better than acceptance! Jelissa Q. and Lawton at Monarch

Tuesday night was our third monthly Mentor Coffee Talk. After some mingling, yummy, hot beverages and a great mentoring discussion, Miki Hodge, Chaffee County Mentors founder, joined us for the last fifteen minutes of the talk. She shared her powerful experience of being mentored as a youth. Within just a few minutes, she gave us some clear reminders that we do not always know the impact we are having on the lives of our youth. She told us how disinterested she became as she grew into being a teenager, and yet how deeply changed she was because her mentors kept showing up regardless of how she acted. “They were consistent,” she said. “And I knew, no matter what, someone would come for me every Wednesday.”

Consistency is such a simple quality. Yet many mentors express feeling like they are not doing enough, or that they don’t believe they are making a difference. Miki reminded all of us that, “Nothing is better than acceptance.” How true this is. Loving acceptance of our youth is what really matters. And as much as we wish our mentees loved all of our ideas, or the activities we planned, or the gifts that we gave them – it is our consistency and acceptance of them that is making the lasting impression.

This is what sticks with Miki after all these years. And she is quite the success story! If you ever need inspiration to stay excited about mentoring, or you just need some reminders of what mentoring is all about – call us! Or call Miki – she says she is here to help us know that we are always having an impact on our kids – just by showing up!

We also encourage you to attend the monthly Coffee Talks for camaraderie and support. There is an abundance of wisdom within our mentoring family! The Coffee Talks are loosely structured so that mentors may show up with whatever challenges, learnings or highlights they wish to share and discuss. Topics that have come up so far: Who should be planning the activities more – the mentor or the youth? How to be most supportive with mentee’s academic needs without pushing them away or making them dread mentoring? What to do when your mentee is lying or stealing? How to get kids to show up when they say they will? How to deal with communication issues?

Our next two Coffee Talks will take place on Tuesday evening, April 28^th from 5:15-6:30pm in the Community Room at Bongo’s Salida Café, and Thursday evening, May 28^th – both in Salida (although we will be planning a talk for Buena Vista soon!). Please stay tuned and read the next newsletter for the location and time of May’s Coffee Talk. We look forward to seeing you soon, and hearing how your mentoring relationship is going!

]]> http://chaffeementors.org/2009/04/theres-nothing-better-than-acceptance/feed/ 2 http://chaffeementors.org/2008/11/highly-decorated-walking/ http://chaffeementors.org/2008/11/highly-decorated-walking/#comments Tue, 18 Nov 2008 19:38:58 +0000 Heather Barron http://chaffeementors.org/?p=581

A group of "highly decorated walkers" - Salida Circus Grand Finale

Cresson Dance Academy from Cripple Creek graced us with a special workshop prior to the Circus Celebration on Saturday, November 15th. Stacy, the dance instructor, who is a petite woman, was hard to pick out from the crowd of her dancers ages 7-17.  But when she began teaching, all eyes and ears were on her.

“Many of us,” she explained, “think you have to be a ‘dancer’ to dance.

Jelissa with Cresson Academy dancers

She lined everyone up and began a stretching warm-up, starting from our toes and working up to our heads.  By the end of the 45 minutes she had us leaping through the air, and turning across the room.  The final activity was a dance jam circle where individuals got to strut their stuff!

Jack flies through the air with the greatest of ease

I will never think of dance in the same way again!  Now as I’m walking down the street I wonder, how would people respond if I did the little “step, step, leap hop” move that we learned.  Perhaps I will try it and let you all know!