INDIANAPOLIS — In the fight over education reform in Indiana, there is one thing that adversaries agree on: A caring adult can make a big difference in the life of an at-risk child.
That’s the message that two foes delivered in tandem Tuesday at a Statehouse press conference, one day before Indiana lawmakers reconvene for a legislative session in which education reform will play a starring role.
Indiana Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Bennett and Indiana State Teachers Association Nate Schnellenberger — who disagree on much — endorsed a statewide effort to recruit more mentors for at-risk youth, citing the critical role they can play in educational success.
“We have to make it our moral obligation to do whatever we can to help every child have a chance to succeed,” Bennett said.
Schnellenberger echoed the sentiment, citing research from the Indiana Youth Institute that shows that students at-risk for academic failure benefit from adult mentors. Their odds of graduating high school and going on to college, for example, are higher than their counterparts.
The press conference was organized by the Indiana Youth Institute, a nonprofit organization that launched the Indiana Mentoring Partnership a year ago.
At that kickoff conference, the head coaches of the state’s longtime sports rivals, Purdue University and Indiana University, shared the podium to endorse the program. At Tuesday’s press conference, IYI President Bill Stanczykiewicz said there are more than 1,300 students across Indiana on a waiting list for mentors. He said the biggest obstacle to recruiting more mentors is that adults fear they lack the know-how to be a good mentor.
Stanczykiewicz said the Indiana Mentoring Partnership can match adults with organizations that provide mentoring training. But he also talked about the most important contribution a mentor can make in the life of a child: “Just be there.”
It was Stanczykiewicz who brought Bennett and Schnellenberger together for the Tuesday press conference.
“There’s often kind of an adversarial view that maybe Tony believes this and Nate views that,” Stanczykiewicz said. “They have the exact same end goal in mind, and that’s the well-being and academic success of Indiana children.”
After the press conference, Stanczykiewicz said the Indiana Youth Institute remains neutral on the education reform proposals that Bennett and Schnellenberger disagree on.
Those proposals range from more charter schools to performance-based teacher pay — both of which have met with strong resistance from ISTA, the largest teachers’ union in Indiana. After the press conference, Bennett and Schnellenberger were bombarded with questions from the media about their opposing views on education reform.
Stanczykiewicz stood off to the side, casually listening. He said he hoped the mentoring message wouldn’t be overshadowed by Statehouse politics.
He said while education reform will be debated for months to come in the Statehouse, that “average, everyday Hoosiers” can engage in their own school reform by volunteering to be a mentor to an at-risk student.
“What happens in the Statehouse is important,” he said. “But if you want to make a real difference in the life of a child, this is how to do it.”
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