New Toolkit: Measuring Benefits of Mentoring for Mentors and Others Outside the Mentoring Relationship

Using These Instruments in Your Program

While this Toolkit can help your mentoring program measure many outcomes more effectively, the recommended instruments will be most effective if used within the context of a well-designed evaluation plan. It should be kept in mind, furthermore, that the instruments are likely to lose their value if they are changed (excepting the potential modifications that are discussed in the Toolkit for selected measures), administered incorrectly, or used in contexts where the desired outcomes are apt to be elusive due to poor program implementation or an insufficient theory of change driving program activities. Please see the Key Evaluation Considerations and Advice for Designing and Administering Evaluation Tools pages for more information about how to maximize the value of these instruments within the context of a strong overall evaluation.

About This Toolkit

The Measurement Guidance Toolkit was developed by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention’s National Mentoring Resource Center (NMRC), through the work of the NMRC Research Board.

New Toolkit: Benefits of Mentoring for Mentors and Others Outside the Mentoring Relationship

Most studies focusing on the impact of youth mentoring programs have examined the effects on the young people served by those programs.¹ Far less research attention has focused on the impact of mentoring on those serving as mentors to young people,¹ and on others outside of, but nevertheless connected to, the mentoring relationship (e.g., parents, teachers, program staff). This section of the Toolkit focuses on measures that assess some of these potential benefits for both mentors (i.e., cultural humility, perspective taking, career identity development, and generativity) and parents/guardians (i.e., parenting stress and family functioning).