BIG BROTHERS BIG SISTERS OF GREATER LOS ANGELES INC
This organization has already been registered
Someone in your organization has already registered and setup an account. would you like to join their team?Profile owner : f*****e@b****a.o*g
Mission Statement
Our Mission: Create and support one-to-one mentoring relationships that ignite the power and promise of youth.
About This Cause
Since its founding in 1955 by Walt Disney and Meredith Willson, Big Brothers Big Sisters of Greater Los Angeles (BBBSLA) has served Los Angeles County through its mission to provide children facing adversity with strong and enduring, professionally supported one-to-one relationships that change their lives for the better, forever. BBBSLA serves youth ages 6-18 throughout Los Angeles County. Historically referred to as “at-risk” and “high-risk”, the youth served by BBBSLA face many difficult challenges and are overwhelmingly youth of color. In 2015, BBBSLA served over 1,600 youth, of which: 96% were youth of color; 79% were receiving a free or reduced lunch benefit, and; 61% were residing with a single-parent or with a non-parental guardian, including 119 foster youth. The combination of poverty, family breakdown, and other adverse childhood experiences, including familial incarceration and exposure to trauma, present very real obstacles for many children and youth to reach their full potential. Despite these challenging odds, BBBSLA continues to see how the transformative impact of mentoring changes the trajectory for our most vulnerable and underserved children and youth. For the last four years, BBBSLA has achieved a 95% average graduation rate amongst our graduating seniors, outperforming LAUSD’s average graduation rates. Additionally, while it is estimated that over 60% of our parents do not hold a college degree, 94% of our graduating high school seniors were college bound in 2015. For this reason, we see that BBBSLA’s youth are “at-potential” for continuing their success and achieving beyond all expectations. Our Programs Though the years, BBBSLA has continued to innovate and adapt our mentoring model to deepen our impact in the lives of youth toward measurably improving their odds of reaching their full potential in life. While staying true to building strong, impactful one-to-one mentoring relationships, BBBSLA has successfully expanded our mentoring model to advance critical academic and life skills outcomes through linked learning focusing on career-focused mentoring, school-based programs, a new scholarship program, and through leadership development. 1. Community-Based Mentoring Program: This program features our most common match relationship wherein a child is paired with a carefully screened mentor for a minimum commitment of 12 months. Ensuring the strength and progress of each match is our team of Match Support Specialists, who provide customized support for each match, including regular check-ins with parental guardians. As a result of a highly effective matching process through which volunteers are carefully screened and matched with a youth based on their shared interests and needs, BBBSLA maintains one of the longest average match lengths among its affiliates nationwide with each Community-Based Mentoring match lasting an average of 30 months. 2. Workplace Mentoring Program: In partnership with L.A.-based schools and corporations, BBBSLA empowers youth from our most vulnerable communities to become college, workforce, and life ready through the innovative Workplace Mentoring Program wherein youth participate in a personal, academic, and professional development focused, linked-learning curriculum and receive one-to-one mentoring onsite at some of L.A.’s most influential corporations. Our school partners include Camino Nuevo Charter Academy and Foshay Learning Center. Our corporate partners include Union Bank, Price Waterhouse Coopers, NFL Network, CBS, and Sony Pictures Entertainment. 3. School-Based Mentoring Program: Our School-Based Mentoring Program (SBM) brings Bigs to elementary schools to provide support and encouragement to Littles who have been identified by their teachers and counselors as children who can benefit from a caring mentor. Bigs from the community spend a lunch or recess period once per week with their Little for an academic year. Since 2009, Transamerica has sponsored our 20th Elementary School site, volunteering thousands of hours to mentor our Littles. Other partner schools include Braddock Elementary School and La Ballona Elementary School. 4. High School Bigs Mentoring Program: Unique to the SBM program is BBBSLA’s High School Bigs Program, which encourages high achieving high school students participating in leadership development programs at their schools to serve as Bigs to elementary school Littles. Under the guidance of BBBSLA’s professional staff, high school Bigs are offered an opportunity to apply their leadership skills in a way that instills a value for service and sets an example for some of our youngest Littles. Being able to have hands-on leadership experience promotes their future success while helping our Littles succeed in the present. This program now impacts over 200 students in San Gabriel Valley. Our current HS Bigs partnering schools include Gabrielino High School, San Gabriel High School, McKinley Elementary School, and Roosevelt Elementary School. 5. Women in Entertainment Mentoring Program (WIE): The WIE Program offers young girls who are beating the odds an unprecedented opportunity to receive one-to-one mentorship from some of the most powerful women in the entertainment industry as well as a scholarship to pursue their higher education goals. Beyond academic achievement, the WIE program instills invaluable lessons on leadership, professionalism, and confidence in our young women who are able to carry the wisdom of their mentors far beyond the mentorship match. Our partnering schools include Kennedy High School in San Fernando Valley, Manual Arts High School, West Adams Prep, City Honors, and Belmont High Schools. BBBSLAs’ professionally-supported mentoring services have been proven to improve outcomes across three critical areas: 1) socio-emotional competencies (e.g. higher aspirations, greater self-confidence, and better relationships); 2) avoidance of risky behaviors, and; 3) educational success. Past independent research studies have demonstrated Big Brothers Big Sisters programs make measurable differences in these important developmental areas. By building a strong, one-to-one and professionally-supported mentoring relationship to serve as a foundation for transformative impact and life skills learning, mentoring through BBBSLA’s programs help close both the achievement and opportunity gaps that exist for too many children and youth. As the only national youth mentoring program with evidence-based outcomes, Big Brothers Big Sisters measures the impact for the majority of the Little Brothers and Little Sisters we serve through our Youth Outcomes Survey (YOS). Careful analysis of the survey results allows the agency to be accountable for each youth we serve and nurture their success. Highlights of the survey results for 2015 include: Over 90% of children reported improved or maintained improved confidence in the presence of a special adult relationship in their life. Over 80% of children reported improved or maintained improved educational expectations, with nearly three-fourths reporting improvements in their scholastic competence. Over 70% of children reported improved or maintained an improved sense of parental trust. 78% of children reported improved or maintained improved attitudes toward avoidance of risky behavior. Over half of all children served reported feeling an improved sense of social acceptance.