Finding 40 is a play on the purpose of my 40th birthday party October 13,2019. We will celebrate at the ArtHouse, located at 411 E 5th Ave Gary, In 46402 from 6:00 pm to 9:00 pm. Tickets will be sold at $50 per person, and all proceeds will go to support Male Mentoring in Northwest Indiana.

I believe as a woman growing up in this area I have had access to a number of female mentors throughout my life that has laid a path for the ultimate success of my Finding 40 years of age. Because I had to find it, with bumps in the road, detours and triumphs to get here! I believe that mentorship is an integral part of the evolution of any group.

“One of the greatest values of mentors is the ability to see ahead what others cannot see and to help them navigate a course to their destination.” — John C. Maxwell

I do not believe that young men have the same access as young women do to positive role models that take the time to help them navigate the course to their destination. In my community I have seen two groups of male mentors, those that mentor but easily get worn out because the lack of resources available to them, and those that don’t mentor because they cannot step away from their job to offer free services to the detriment of their own families and finances.

OJJDP (Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention) best practice is to encourage that mentors be volunteers. We have a number of government funded mentoring programs that either request that the mentor volunteer their services or the mentor is paid an hourly rate for mentoring but is not reimbursed for any money spent while mentoring. This detours men (usually the primary breadwinner in the family) to mentor young men, because they do not have the finances to support outside activities for children that are not theirs.

With this Finding 40 fundraiser, mentors will have the ability to submit a receipt for whatever money they spend on their mentee and I will reimburse them for the dollar amount used for the mentee only. I will collaborate with local mentoring programs such as Rising Stars, City Life Center, Males with a plan, and New Horizon to reimburse their mentors when the grant funds that they receive will not reimburse the mentor. I will also encourage mentors to register with my partner organizations to assist in strengthening local nonprofits that are positioned and doing this work.

I am doing this in hopes that I can engage more positive male mentors, to invest in young men in Northwest Indiana and I this will also work to strengthen organizations in the community currently doing this work.