What we do

Mentoring

Mentoring helps to unleash potential, and at Reach Mentoring, we want to create a trusted space where young people can consistently meet with a trained mentor within one of our partner schools:

  • School refers young person

    Reach Mentoring works with young people for a wide variety of reasons: self worth, behavioural issues, anxiety, difficult life circumstances and more.

  • Commit to journeying weekly

    Each young person is paired with a trained mentor who they meet once a week, often for a year or more. 

  • Build relationship

    Using a person-centred approach, the mentor and young person use the weekly space to discuss current life circumstances and set goals for the future. 

  • Trust the process

    Working in partnership with the wider school team, we collect baseline assessments on a termly basis. This provides a snapshot insight into the young person’s self perception of their own wellbeing.

Connect

In this model, the Reach worker is a consistent, regular presence within the school community, usually for the duration of the full academic year. The main asset to the Reach Connect model is the adaptive and flexible nature it takes. The model isn’t set to a rigid framework and can adapt to address pressing issues to support the school Pastoral Care Team.  In contrast to the traditional Reach model, where a pupil meets their mentor each week across the full school year, the Reach Connect model can provide a more time-sensitive approach.

“It has changed the entire dynamics of our school. We are now able to have a whole-school approach to the care of our young people… Having a Reach Connect worker is something that every school needs to embrace. I think the unique provision of Reach in schools enables so many young people to achieve their full potential; that idea that a mentor comes alongside a young person and champions them is something that every school wants to be able to say that they provide for their young people and Reach really enables us to do that.”

Clounagh Junior High School

Personal Development

While Mentoring facilitates many moments with one young person, our Personal Development programme facilitates one moment with many young people. In the ‘Elephant in the Room’ (2017) report, young people identified the need to have a safe space in schools to engage with their mental health and well being.  Whether through film or workshops, Reach Mentoring aims to give pupils the supportive space and opportunity to engage their bodies, hearts and minds in topics relevant to them.

For primary schools we provide:

  • My Story in Colour, a workshop carried out in primary schools in June each year. The workshop is based around a relevant topic, with a general focus on resilience.  Pupils move through a carousel of stations, beginning with a story written by the Reach team and a creative activity. Each young person will then have the opportunity to talk with a trained mentor during a mini-mentoring session.


For post-primary schools we provide:

  • A library of videos and session plans, available on YouTube, focusing on relevant topics appropriate for a range of ages. Topics include Change, Managing Emotions, Self-Awareness and Body Image.


Throughout the academic year, we aim to give pupils the supportive space and opportunity to engage and explore topics relevant to them, through creative and discursive workshops in post-primary schools.