Big Brothers Big Sisters needs everyday volunteers like YOU! There's no greater gift than your time. Simply by giving your friendship once a week you can be the difference to help change a young life. We work with tamariki aged 6 to 12; young people with adverse childhood experiences who would benefit from a stable, consistent, positive role model to help them navigate and grow in life. Our volunteer mentors/tuakana are matched with one child/teina. They hang out together for one session, each week, for a year. It's really important our mentors can fulfil this time commitment as this is how our young people build trust and take benefit from the program. The mentor/tuakana, child/teina and child’s caregivers are all supported by professionally trained staff for the lifetime of the match. Through these long term and meaningful friendships our young people feel cared for and valued, they become enlightened, empowered, and view themselves, their whānau, and their community in a more positive way. Our early intervention strengths-based approach meets their most basic developmental needs and interacts flexibly and supportively with our tamariki. With such need and around 70 children waiting patiently on our matching list we always need more volunteers! Mentors come from diverse backgrounds, they are regular everyday people who don't need any special skills or training, just a desire to be a friend and have a positive impact on a young life. COMMUNITY BASED MENTORING Mentors collect their young person from home each week, and spend time together out in the community doing fun activities they both already enjoy. The session is once a week, for a couple of hours, either after school or at the weekends. SCHOOL BASED MENTORING Mentors visit their young person at school each week, they spend one hour together doing fun activities they both enjoy keeping to the school grounds. This is once each week, during school time and terms. All activities are encouraged to be low or no cost. Research and studies show mentoring has proven to produce improved outcomes for tamariki and rangatahi regarding drug use, violent behaviour, crime, school performance and family relationships. It also builds resilience, confidence, ignites potential, and provides hope for the future.  Mentored boys are 2 times less likely to develop negative conducts like bullying, fighting, lying, cheating, or losing their temper.  Mentored boys are 2 times more likely to believe that school is fun and that doing well academically is important.  Mentored girls are 4 times less likely to bully, fight, lie or express anger than girls without a mentor. A word from our children “Everyone in my family are girls, now I have a guy I can spend time, go fishing and biking riding with.” “She’s so nice to me, she spends time with me, not because she’s forced to but because she wants to” “I love everything about my big sister, she’s fun, caring, and does heaps of things with me, she’s like my real big sister” “I’ve really been able to talk to him about stuff I haven’t been able to talk to anybody else about before” “He listens to me. He’s nice. He helps me with things.” “I love my big sister! Seeing her is my favourite part of the week” For more information, please feel free to get in touch!