Is there any online (youth) community for Overseas Chinese?

City staff as mentors to youth in the community

• A city I'm working with is looking at developing a mentoring program that will match city staff with youth in their community and school programs. They'd like to find other localities (cities, counties, towns, etc.) that have a similar program that utilizes staff as mentors, including how they handle the issue of giving staff time off.

• Answer:

  Hello griffinjay-ga, This turned out to be a tougher search than I expected. Surprisingly, there is very little information available on the Web regarding local and county government agency employee participation in community volunteer or mentoring programs. It seems that less than half of the states have laws granting special leave benefits to state employees who participate in community service volunteer programs. I was able to locate a few county and municipal programs that mirror what is mandated for state employees. I also found a few references to “volunteer leave” or “mentoring leave” benefits in some labor contracts negotiated by state and municipal employee unions. I hope that the sample policies and practices I’ve collected will meet your needs. In addition, I’ve also included some mentoring portal sites to help you with further research. Best wishes for implementing your mentoring program. czh ================================================ EXAMPLES OF LOCAL / COMMUNITY MENTORING PROGRAMS ================================================ http://www.nlc.org/nlc_org/site/newsroom/nations_cities_weekly/display.cfm?id=E2D4346E-FC36-4E0D-A974159EFF58C06F Local Governments Granting Time Off to Give Back to Community While many private sector companies have long promoted volunteerism among employees, the public sector is a relative newcomer to granting its employees leave and paid time off to participate in community service. ***** This short 2001 article mentions a few municipal programs that grant time off for volunteer work. It mentions the following cities: “Employees of the City of Boynton Beach, Fla., Newport News, Va., and Dallas, Tex., are allowed to spend one hour each week serving as mentors and tutors in city schools; while public employees of Kansas City, Mo., will be paid for 90 minutes of mentoring per week in area schools.” http://www.flcities.com/mentoring/ Florida League of Cities – Governor’s Municipal Mentoring Initiative The Toolkit for Establishing a Mentoring Program is a 56 page document that includes a large section on sample policies and forms that might be helpful for your project. The links to Florida Cities Involved with Mentoring Program will help you identify localities that you might want to contact on your own. The directory offers the following information for each program: --------------------- City of Cape Canaveral Contact: Susan Stills, City Clerk/Human Resources Director, 105 Polk Ave., Cape Canaveral, FL 32920 Phone: (321) 868-1220/1221 Fax: (321) 868-1248 E-mail: [email protected] Policy Summary: One hour per week of paid administrative leave. Partner: Cape View Elementary School. Description: Once a week volunteers see a student to work on the student’s reading or basic concepts of computer literacy. http://www.flamentoring.org/myflorida/governorsoffice/mentoring/ Florida Governor’s Mentoring Initiative This site offers further information for Florida resources for mentoring. http://www.employeementors.com/index.htm Stanislaus County Employee Mentor Program The Stanislaus County Employee Mentor program was unanimously approved by our Board of Supervisors in June of 1999. As a first year pilot (implementation began January 2000), the program boasted over 50 employees mentoring primarily in one to one activities through year one. In year two, with the onset of the team based programming (project AIM), the employee support skyrocketed to over 100 county employees. The program - both one on one and team based continues to grow each year and is a true testimonial to the corporate citizenship model that is embodied by Stanislaus County employees. Today (2003) we are proud to declare that over 250 Stanislaus County employees have actively participated, are currently mentoring or in the process of being matched with a protégé! ***** See the link for A CORPORATE CITIZENSHIP MODEL.. This paper summarizes the provisions of the program. Pages 6-7 explain the “incentive pay provisions of the program. ======================================== POLICIES ON STAFF TIME OFF FOR MENTORING ======================================== http://ncosp.osp.state.nc.us/Secure/PMIS/168.html http://www.osp.state.nc.us/manuals/2000/c-serve.pdf COMMUNITY SERVICE LEAVE FOR STATE EMPLOYEES In recognition of the State’s diverse needs for volunteers to support schools, communities, citizens and non-profit organizations, and recognizing the commitment of state employees to engage in volunteer service to the State, the North Carolina Office of State Personnel shall establish a program for awarding Community Service Leave to state employees subject to the State Personnel Act. ***** This North Carolina document is a sample executive order that establishes leave for state employees to serve as mentors. It gives very detailed parameters for such leave. Many other states have similar laws and policies for state government employees. http://www.dpa.ca.gov/benefits/CompensationPlus/Leave5.shtm State of California -- Mentoring Leave Eligible excluded employees may receive up to 40 hours of paid Mentoring Leave per calendar year to participate in mentoring activities once they have used an equal amount of their personal time for this activity. Mentoring Leave may only be used by an employee to mentor. Mentoring activities include structured, one-to-one relationships which are focused on the needs of at-risk children or youth (Grades K-12) organized through a bonafide mentoring organization. http://laborproject.berkeley.edu/contracts/familyleave.html American Federation of State, County & Municipal Employees Local 2620 & State of California: AFSCME negotiated for Unit 19 members to receive up to forty (40) hours of "mentoring leave" per calendar year to participate in mentoring activities once they have used an equal amount of their personal time for these activities. "Mentoring leave" is paid leave time that may only by used by an employee to mentor. It does not include travel to and from the "mentoring" location. http://www.nlc.org/nlc_org/site/ The National League of Cities The National League of Cities is the oldest and largest national organization representing municipal governments throughout the United States. Its mission is to strengthen and promote cities as centers of opportunity, leadership, and governance. ***** The NLC offers a variety of resources for anyone interested in municipal government. It also offers special services to its members, icluding: “CityNet is the password-protected section of the National League of Cities home page and serves as an online community for elected city officials, managers, and city staff.” =================== MENTORING RESOURCES =================== http://www.mentoring.org/about_us/about_us.adp National Mentoring Partnership Mentoring programs around the country can rely on MENTOR for cutting-edge products and services to help them grow their programs. Through our National Mentoring Institute, we offer solutions that are both cost-effective and easy to access: from online training and recruitment to e-mentoring standards and tool kits to counsel from experts. ***** See especially the section on MentorWorks Research for information about designing and evaluating mentoring programs. See also the link to State Partnerships which will take you to the “State and Local Mentoring Partnerships in 23 states and 15 urban centers.” http://www.nwrel.org/mentoring/resources.html The National Mentoring Center has collected a number of on-line resources related to mentoring. They are arranged by topic, spanning from general mentoring guides to more specific subjects. http://www.bsr.org/BSRResources/WhitePaperDetail.cfm?DocumentID=158 Business for Social Responsibility -- White Paper on Volunteerism ***** See especially the section on sample policies. http://www.afscme.org/ AMERICAN FEDERATION OF STATE, COUNTY AND MUNICIPAL EMPLOYEES, AFL-CIO ***** A search of this union’s web site doesn’t provide any information about volunteer leave benefits for the employees they represent. =============== SEARCH STRATEGY =============== Voluntary Services Leave Community Service Leave mentoring leave municipal mentoring programs laws "community service leave" county employee volunteer mentor mentoring programs leave benefits