MindTrails

Profiles in Mentoring: A Conversation with Dr. Alex Werntz about “that magic key ingredient” of mentoring and paraprofessional service delivery

Interviewed by Jean Rhodes Alexandra Werntz  is a postdoctoral researcher with Dr. Jean Rhodes at the Center for Evidence-based Mentoring and with Dr. Bethany Teachman at the University of Virginia. She received her Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the University of Virginia in 2020, specializing in supportive accountability for technology-delivered interventions. Her dissertation focused on […]

Do you have a teenage mentee who is anxious, worried, or stressed? Mindtrails is now recruiting!

Do you mentor a teen who is anxious, worried, or stressed? Mindtrails is now enrolling!

What lessons can be learned from a supportive accountability study on an online anxiety intervention?

Werntz, A., Silverman, A. L., Behan, H., Patel, S. K., Beltzer, M., Boukhechba, M. O., Barnes, L., & Teachman, B. A. (in press). Lessons learned: Providing supportive accountability in an online anxiety intervention. Behavior Therapy.  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.beth.2021.12.002 Summarized by Ariel Ervin Notes of Interest: Although technology-delivered interventions (TDI) can help bridge the gap in seeking mental […]

Teen Depression and Anxiety: Why the Kids Are Not Alright

  By Susanna Schrobsdorff, Reprinted from from TIME The first time Faith-Ann Bishop cut herself, she was in eighth grade. It was 2 in the morning, and as her parents slept, she sat on the edge of the tub at her home outside Bangor, Maine, with a metal clip from a pen in her hand. […]

“There’s an App for that!”: How technology-delivered interventions could revolutionize mentoring

by Jean Rhodes In an influential chapter, mentoring researchers Timothy Cavell and Chris Elledge (2014) argued that the field of youth mentoring needs to move from the common “relationship as intervention” model (i.e., the friendship model where the primary goal is form a close bond) to a “relationship as a context for intervention” model. In this latter […]

MentorHub gives kids and their mentors digital resources for education and wellness

UMass Boston’s Dr. Jean Rhodes is piloting her MentorHub app in collaboration with Big Brothers Big Sisters of Eastern Massachusetts (BBBSEM) in hopes of bringing mentors and mentees closer, as well as encourage usage of educational and wellness apps among youth.  In this article, Rhodes, author of the book “Older and Wiser: New Ideas for […]

Project work: Strategies for program leaders to help and support teens overcome anxiety

Orson, C. N., & Larson, R. W. (2020). Helping Teens Overcome Anxiety Episodes in Project Work: The Power of Reframing. Journal of Adolescent Research, 0743558420913480. https://doi.org/10.1177/0743558420913480 Summarized by Ariel Ervin Notes of Interest:  Some teenagers can experience intense anxiety whenever they encounter overwhelming challenges This study aims to understand how experienced program leaders help and support youths […]

Youth anxiety: What to say when your mentee is anxious

Written by Carey Wallace, time.com Today’s kids are more worried than any kids in recent history. According to some long-term surveys of mental-health literature, the average kid today is more anxious than people who were hospitalized for anxiety in the 1950s. And those worries tend to intensify around times of transition — like the start […]