POE Mentors Never Stop Learning

Among the important elements of POE is that we provide mentorship to our scholars throughout the entire time that they receive financial support.  The goal of this mentorship is to do the best job possible to help students be successful.  To help in this, in early August, a group of POE mentors gathered to discuss key topics that come up when providing guidance to POE scholars.  

The topics covered were:

• Finances: A brush up on the complexities of helping a student with their finances.  There are many guidelines and requirements.  Our students need to do lots of homework in this area, and so do mentors.
• Job Advice: Getting a job between each year of college and moving into a career are both stressful and demanding for students. Our mentors discussed tips on helping the process.  Two of the highest priorities are network, network, network; and start looking for a job in the fall – even if the goal is to get a job for the following summer.
• Communicating with POE Students:  Every student has different needs.  Therefore, in addition to speaking with students at least twice a year and communicating when money is distributed, mentors provided several suggestions for working with students that are facing different issues.

If you are a mentor and want to see more detail from the get-together, see the memo that is included among the POE Mentor Resources on the web site.  https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B3dXI2eA_aRMVUh3Q2tvVHVISzQ