At-Risk Young Adults With Mentors Go to College at Higher Rates

At-risk young people who had a mentor aspired to attend college and enrolled at higher rates than did their peers without mentors. That’s according to a survey commissioned by the National Mentoring Partnership that was scheduled for release on Monday.

About three-quarters of at-risk young adults (ages 18 to 21) with a mentor reported that they had always planned to go to and graduate from college, compared with 56 percent of those who didn’t have a mentor.

Forty-five percent of at-risk young adults with a mentor said they were enrolled in college or were about to enroll, compared with 29 percent of those who didn’t have a mentor.

The survey asked young people about other outcomes, like their involvement in extracurricular activities, as well.

A report on the survey’s findings, “The Mentoring Effect: Young People’s Perspectives on the Outcomes and Availability of Mentoring,” was written by Civic Enterprises, a public-policy and strategy firm, in association with Hart Research Associates. It is based on a nationally representative survey of 1,109 young adults, ages 18 to 21, conducted in the summer of 2013.