The Kindness of Strangers

The Kindness of Strangers takes a hard, realistic look at mentoring while offering a vivid portrayal of the mentoring movement and how ordinary citizens in cities across America are trying to turn young lives around. 1. A Call to Action
2. Great Expectations
3. Recurring Fervor
4. Birth of a Movement
5. The Benefits of Mentoring
6. The Limits of Mentoring
7. Making the Most of Mentoring
8. Closing the Caring Gap
9. Re-engaging the Middle Class
10. Reinventing Community MARC FREEDMAN has studied education and youth programs for more than a decade and is director of special projects for Public/Private Ventures, a research and development organization based in Philadelphia that focuses on helping kids in poverty. He lives in Berkeley, California. Many of us care deeply about the fate of young people growing up in poverty. We worry about their future and the future of an increasingly fragmented society. We want to help, but it's often hard to know how, or even where to start.The Kindness of Strangers reveals how caring adults in cities across America are trying to turn young lives around. It also tells of the much celebrated mentoring movement they have created. In this vivid portrayal of that movement, Marc Freedman shows how ordinary citizens can reach out to the children who are growing up in poverty and community violence--alone, exposed, and forgotten.Based on interviews with over three hundred mentors, youths, foundation officials, scholars, and youth workers, The Kindness of Strangers takes a hard look at mentoring: How much can really be accomplished? What makes the difference between a successful program and a program fraught with difficulties? What kinds of people make the most effective mentors? Is mentoring really the best way to reach kids with tough lives? Marc Freedman brings experience, research, and realism to these questions in an effort to reach the truth about today's mentoring movement. Based on interviews with over three hundred mentors, youths, foundation officials, scholars, and youth workers, The Kindness of Strangers takes a hard look at mentoring: How much can really be accomplished? What makes the difference between a successful program and a program fraught with difficulties? What kinds of people make the most effective mentors? Is mentoring really the best way to reach kids with tough lives? Marc Freedman brings experience, research, and realism to these questions in an effort to reach the truth about today's mentoring movement.