The Cross-Age Mentoring Program (CAMP) for Children with Adolescent Mentors is a school-based, after-school program designed to provide groups of teenage mentors the structure, guidance, and support needed to effectively mentor younger children. CAMP targets improvements in both the children's (mentees') and the adolescents' (mentors') connectedness to school, teachers, family, peers/friends, and self (where connectedness is defined as positive affect toward and consistent engagement in contexts, relationships and activities). A year-long connectedness curriculum (for 4th-6th grade mentees) targets multiple domains of connectedness with domain-specific activities (e.g., projects involving teachers and parents). Guidelines are presented for staff and experienced mentors to create new activities for subsequent program years or for different youth populations (e.g., for middle school age or health promotion specifically). CAMP is a universal or primary prevention program intended and appropriate for hybrid groups of youth at varying levels of risk for academic, social, or behavioral problems (the ratio of high to low risk mentees should not exceed 1:5). In CAMP youth meet in mentor-mentee dyads within a small group setting (
About the Author: Michael J. Karcher, Ed.D., Ph.D., is a Professor of Educational Psychology in the College of Education and Human Development at the University of Texas at San Antonio. He received a doctorate in Human Development and Psychology from Harvard University (1997) and a doctorate in Educational Psychology, in the APA-Approved Counseling Psychology Training Program, from the University of Texas at Austin (1999). He conducts research on school-based and cross-age peer mentoring as well as on adolescent connectedness and pair counseling. He authored the Cross-age Mentoring Program (CAMP) program, the implementation for which is described in CAMP Program Manual, Training Guide, Connectedness Curriculum, and Mentor Handbook. These materials have been reviewed by and are listed on the website of SAMASA's National Registry of Effective Programs and Practices. Published by Developmental Press, these manuals are distributed by Boy With A Ball International (http: //www.boywithaball.com) which operates the CAMP in the US and Internationally. https: //www.youtube.com/watch?v=nSEbuD20HZA In San Antonio, the program operates under the student-chosen name "Velocity" at Harlandale High School, as well as in other US Cities, Africa, and Latin America. see http: //www.boywithaball.com/ and https: //www.youtube.com/watch?v=CEsgOgvrm7Q Dr. Karcher has committed to donating revenue from sales of CAMP materials to this non-profit youth-development organization through 2020. Dr. Karcher draws on his experience developing and coordinating the CAMP program and his other research on youth mentoring to help mentoring programs improve the outcomes of their efforts. He has worked with both Big Brothers Big Sisters of Canada to revise its school-based ("in-school") mentoring programs, and with Big Brothers Big Sisters of America to strengthen their High School Bigs program using results from the first evaluation of that program, on which Dr. Karcher served as a technical advisor. He is on the editorial board for five national journals and research and advisory boards of BBBSA, MENTOR, the Texas Mentoring Partnership and National Mentoring Partnership.