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The start of the programme
The mentorship programme started on a formal basis in the youth ministry in 2005. This arose from the experience of training the youth ministry’s leaders in the previous year. There were a lot of leaders and the ministry needed to find a way of maintaining a close relationship with the leaders during their year of being leaders in the youth ministry.
The first experiment in 2004 was to divide leaders into groups that each had one mentor. There was no formal training for the mentors and no structure as to how to maintain this relationship. The result was that the mentorship relationships gradually faded during the course of the year. There were too many leaders assigned to one mentor and the programme was not structured enough.
After this year we (myself and the leadership executive) decided to formalise the programme and appointed a ministry leader to run this ministry. My role changed and I became involved in the training side of the programme.
The development of the programme
The programme started by focussing on the leaders in the youth ministry. These leaders were mostly Sunday school teachers and volunteers who organised the various aspects for the ministry like outreach or worship events. The programme was made compulsory for each leader (there were about 25 leaders). Each leader had to choose his/her own mentor for the duration of their one-year period of leadership in the ministry. These mentors were trained and guided during the course of the year. There were also meetings for feedback on the process during the year.
After the first year of mentorship in 2005, the programme had generated positive feedback from those involved. This feedback led to the expansion of the programme to include the grade 11 learners that were in their confirmation year at church. This year required from them that the grade 11s attended a weekly group or class with a minister, participated in a camp at the beginning of the year and eventually to meet all the requirements to participate in the confirmation ceremony, where young people could confess their faith at a service of the congregation.
In the past the requirements for confirmation included a conversation with a church council member at the end of the year. This church council member would then recommend to the church that this young person is ready to be confirmed.
The general feeling grew that this process was inadequate. In the first instance a stranger (in most of the cases) who had no prior relationship with this young person, had to conduct one conversation with the grade 11 learner. This was difficult for both parties. In the second place we sensed the need for a young person to also have a relationship with an individual during the course of the confirmation year. The classes they attended (of which the congregation has five, are attended by an average of 70 young people per annum) were in a group form. This was a positive experience for most of the young people, but it still left the gap of individual relationships.
The positive feedback of the mentorship programme, arising from the leadership group, led to the expansion of the programme to include the confirmees. The programme has basically been implemented in the same way since 2006. The mentorship programme thus developed into having two legs: the leaders of the youth ministry and the confirmees in grade 11.
The programme initially included about 100 young people per annum, together with their respective mentors. The programme has developed in various ways since 2005. There was growth in the way the mentors were trained, chosen, et cetera. There were also valuable lessons learned through the years that helped to improve the contents of the programme.
The contents of the programme
My involvement with the programme had more to do with the contents and training of the mentors. The ministry leader focussed on the narratives, feedback and support of the mentors themselves.
The contents of the programme have always been set within an open, narrative approach to mentorship as opposed to the more modernistic “10 steps” of mentorship approaches. This is due to my own academic positioning on the one hand, but also due to the way mentors would comment on their experiences and what worked well for them through the various years.
The contents of the programme in 2005 also differ from the programme presented in 2008. The contents will also not be same in the future, as it develops with the programme and is constantly informed by the narratives of the mentors and mentees. The context also changes and therefore we adapt the training and the contents to correspond with it.
We will discuss mentorship and the way mentorship is understood extensively in later chapters. We will also look at relevant literature and the various ways that mentorship is understood in various contexts. I do however deem it necessary to make a few comments on mentorship here as it is understood within the programme. This will help the reader to understand the way mentorship is locally interpreted in the narratives from the programme.
The context of confirmation in the Dutch Reformed Church
Although the programme has more than one leg, the strongest leg of the programme with the most participants, is the confirmation year leg. Most of the co-researchers come from this leg of the programme and many of the narratives referred to within Hanlie’s narrative relate to this part of the programme. Therefore I choose to make a few background comments on the practice of confirmation in the Dutch Reformed Church to assist the reader in understanding the context better.
Within reformed theology a child is taken to be baptised by the parents of the child when he or she is small. During the baptism the parents promise to teach and model the love of God to this child as he or she grows up. During this time each young person can come to their own understanding of God’s love and redemption for them and choose to publically declare their faith and their wish to become part of a congregation of their own accord. Within the reformed tradition and the South African context this is done at a confirmation ceremony in a church service, usually at the end of grade eleven (or at seventeen years of age).
During childhood, children attend Sunday school at church. Here they learn more about faith and the Bible. In the final year of Sunday school (during grade eleven) young people usually attend confirmation classes before the confirmation ceremony. A minister usually conducts these classes. The classes aim at helping young people in this final year to become confirmed members of a congregation.
Chapter 1: POSITIONING
1. INTRODUCTION
2. EPISTEMOLOGY
3. THEOLOGY
4. RESEARCH
Chapter 2: THE NARRATIVE OF THE MENTORSHIP PROGRAMME
1. DESCRIBING THE CONTEXT OF THE MENTORSHIP PROGRAMME
2. THE BACKGROUND OF THE MENTORSHIP PROGRAMME AND ITS DEVELOPMENT
3. THE NARRATIVE OF HANLIE BEZUIDENHOUT
4. IN CLOSING
Chapter 3: THE NARRATIVES OF THE CO-RESEARCHERS
1. THE SELECTION OF THE CO-RESEARCERS AND LISTENING TO THEIR NARRATIVES
2. THE NARRATIVE OF COENRAAD AND CARINA BEKKER
3. THE NARRATIVE OF CHRISTA SMIT AND BARRY STEENKAMP
4. THE NARRATIVE OF ROELEEN AND JEANÉ LEMMER
5. THE NARRATIVE OF VALIZE SCHOLTZ
6. IN CLOSING
Chapter 4: INTERPRETING EXPERIENCES AND HAVING THE DIFFERENT NARRATIVES CONVERSE WITH EACH OTHER
1. INTERPRETATIONS THICKENED THROUGH INTERDISCIPLINARY INVESTIGATION
2. MAKING INTERPRETATIONS ABOUT EXPERIENCES AND THE NARRATIVES TOLD
3. TRADITIONS OF INTERPRETATION
4. REFLECTING ON THE RELIGIOUS AND SPIRITUAL ASPECTS OF OUR NARRATIVES AND EXPERIENCES
5. IN CLOSING
Chapter 5: A BRIEF OVERVIEW OF MENTORSHIP LITERATURE
1. Mentoring and coaching: tools and techniques for implementation – Meyer and Fourie
2. The coaching Bible – McDermott and Jago
3. John Maxwell
4. Mentoring – Bob Biehl
5. Mentoring future leaders – Learning Link International
6. Coaching to excellence – UCT Graduate School
7. Tuesdays with Morrie – Albom
9. IN CLOSING
Chapter 6: DEVELOPING ALTERNATIVE INTERPRETATIONS THAT POINT BEYOND THE LOCAL
1. MANY VOICES
2. CONCLUDING REMARKS
3. A SUGGESTED APPROACH TO MENTORSHIP
4. IN CLOSING
Chapter 7: REFLECTION ON MY RESEARCH
BIBLIOGRAPHY
