Mentor Me Programme in Primary Schools

Mentor Me is an in-school mentoring service offered free to Chippenham Primary schools. The service is free because it is delivered by volunteers – all recruited, vetted, trained and supervised by The RISE Trust.  The RISE are kindly supported by Chippenham Borough Lands with funding to enable this.

The aim of Mentor Me is to support pupils by complimenting the pastoral work undertaken in schools and offers pupils, referred by school, regular, quality 1-1 time with a positive, enthusiastic, interested adult.  The volunteer can act as an advocate and is someone who only has the best interests of the child at heart.

The mentor offers consistency and continuity via weekly term time sessions (for up to 6 months) and builds a relationship based on trust and respect. The mentor can be a listening ear and sounding board for the mentee, if and when they wish to talk about themselves, their school, siblings, friends, home life, something they have seen or heard that’s unsettled or confused them – anything they want to chat about.

Mentoring can provide relaxed ‘time out’ of the structured school day for pupils who would benefit from some quiet time or time to talk and has had many positive effects on the young people we’ve worked with. Although mentoring takes place in school the mentor is seen as independent by mentees as they are there on behalf of the RISE Trust and not a member of school staff and only attend school to see the mentee.  A mentoring session, usually an hour in length, can consist of arts and crafts, playing board games or simply chatting depending on the mentee’s likes and their age.  Mentoring is not counselling but the mentor can support a child with problem solving and, if need be, can liaise with the school in support of the child

Contact us for more information and an initial discussion.

Enquiries regarding volunteering with The RISE Trust can be made to Vicky Watt on 01249 464008 or email to vickyw@therisetrust.org

Mentoring in Secondary Schools

The RISE Trust runs the ‘Mentoring’ programme in Chippenham secondary schools which provides valuable one-to-one adult interaction to pupils with a trained member of staff.  This service is provided through a Service Level Agreement with The RISE Trust and takes place at the secondary school.

  • A mentor is seen as a ‘neutral’ and the child can talk without being judged.
  • Mentoring is about building a relationship of trust and respect, and then journeying with the young person.
  • A mentoring session consists of talking and often the student wants to talk about their feelings and worries.
  • Mentors provide a listening ear to the young person.
  • Our trained mentors are not counsellors, and cannot make decisions for the students.
  • The mentoring sessions take place in school for typically 30 minutes weekly

Contact us for more information and an initial discussion.