Mentors
HOPEFUL is an intervention designed to help young women. HOPEFUL is designed to be used with the support of a mentor. Mentors are selected by the young women themselves.
Hope means really attending to a person no matter their situation, having compassion, proper listening, proper attending. You can instil hope by not speaking, just sitting beside somebody and listening to their story, sharing their plight. Instilling hope is about trying to resist being prescriptive. It’s about having real empathy.
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HOPEFUL is currently only available for young women and their mentors involved in The Looking Forward Project. You can find out more about the project and contact the research team.
How mentors could help
We are testing a new way of helping young women who are not in education, employment, or training. We use the word “NEET” for short. We created this approach with NEET young women and the people that support them. It is called HOPEFUL. Currently we are testing whether HOPEFUL is helpful.
Evidence suggests that mentoring should help young women to feel more hopeful. Research shows that relationships are a powerful source of hope. Individuals and groups can foster environments in which young people can set meaningful goals, find pathways, and be motivated to work towards those goals.
Research shows that mentoring instils hope for young people. Mentors can support young people’s hope in many ways. These include being a role model, promoting self-worth and independence, providing support and encouragement, and being a source of information and social connection.
One of the most powerful things when we promote hope is to put forward the idea that “I’m invested in this as well and I’m doing this because I care and I believe things will get better for you”. If you can get that message across, that’s incredibly powerful.
Testimonials
"Hope is just one of those things that never ends, if you run out and somebody else has got hope, they can push you to find it."
Sophie
26 years
"It's all really helpful. It's set out really well, the layout of it, the theme, the videos, it's all really good, down to other people's stories, which is really nice to hear."
Indy
21 years
"It's pushed me to do the things that I want to do and the things that are meaningful to me."
Kit
24 years