Supporting Teens through Social Distancing: MentorOn Partnerships
PROJECT LEAD: Pamela Taylor
PROJECT CONTRIBUTORS: Justine Kim, Lizzie Manning, Alison Sizer, Jin Sohn, Camille Talag, and Jessica Wang
AUTHOR: Camille Talag
PROJECT DESCRIPTION
As a direct result of research, the Teen Social Distancing team identified an opportunity for Emergency Design Collective (EDC) to consult for MentorOn, an emerging peer-to-peer virtual mentorship platform for young adults, adolescents, and children.
MentorOn currently has 40 participants, and is seeing high demand for additional participants. However, the team lacks the resources and know-how to expand.
A spin-off volunteer team (that’s us!) was formed for this partnership. Based on initial conversations with the MentorOn team, we set out to answer:
How might we increase the number of students who can participate in MentorOn without (1) increasing the founder’s workload and (2) decreasing the quality of the participant experience?
During our fast-paced three week consulting sprint, we added capacity to MentorOn by providing the following:
Research insights and user survey
Market analysis
Ecosystem maps and operational recommendations
Defined vision
Financial and legal requirements for expansion
Recommended next steps
Members of the MentorOn and EDC teams in a video call
RESEARCH AND INSIGHTS
Primary research
Our team conducted ethnographic interviews with 10 individuals spanning MentorOn’s stakeholders: founders, collaborators, mentors (high school students), mentees (elementary and middle school students), and supervisors (college students). We also received legal advice from lawyers about best practices for scaling up MentorOn.
Secondary research
Our team also conducted market research in order to develop a market analysis positioning MentorOn in the business landscape. We also looked at similar program’s branding to develop a vision statement, as well as several avenues for funding.
Insights
Based on the above research, we have developed 6 insights that have informed our short-term recommendations for MentorOn to implement:
There is a need to reduce the workload of the leadership team. Our recommendations include adding more formal processes to vet and onboard participants, improve communication with parents, and automate administrative functions.
College supervisors can add more value than their current role allows. Supervisors can take on more administrative tasks in order to offload pressure from the founders, which can be further improved by streamlining communication.
Current communication gaps create inefficiencies. Our recommendations for addressing these inefficiencies include the creation of clear roles and responsibilities for support staff, a dedicated email address for administrative functions, routine check ins with the team, a streamlined work schedule, and regular follow ups using evaluation forms.
Mentees value knowing others in their group. MentorOn can structure mentee groups based on existing relationships, and use icebreaker activities in order to make mentees feel more integrated and comfortable with each other.
Mentors could benefit from more formal training or real-time support. Areas of support include onboarding, routine check ins, and the creation of a situational guide for conflict resolution and other scenarios.
Many involved are interested in expanding MentorOn’s reach. Based on our conversations, MentorOn should consider reaching out to marginalized populations, and would highly benefit from partnering with high schools.
We have also shared long term recommendations for MentorOn to consider as it launches a pilot program, and solidifies its business and financial model.
Grant opportunity matrix created for MentorOn.
Competitive analysis created for MentorOn.
Ecosystem map created for MentorOn
Next steps
The MentorOn team responded enthusiastically to our outputs, and feel confident in continuing to grow the organization based on our recommendations. Our team is currently discussing with MentorOn to develop the following:
A new website
A brand strategy
Call to action
The MentorOn team is seeking the following skills to continue to improve and grow:
Brand strategist
Graphic designer
Copywriter
Grant writer
If you are interested in contributing, please reach out to Pamela Taylor at pam.m.taylor@gmail.com.