Friendship Works Mentoring Service

More Information

Friendship Works offers long-term mentoring in London to support children and young adults who have experienced childhood trauma and disrupted attachments. Experiences like these often result in low self-esteem and social isolation, which can significantly impact the young person’s future.

We match children and young adults with volunteer mentors who offer access to new opportunities, helping to build self-esteem, develop self-confidence and promote resilience – all working to grow self-belief and empower the young person to better manage adversity, whether now or in the future. 

80% of young people our volunteer mentors support said they felt happier. 76% of care experienced young adults felt more positive about their future.

Becoming a mentor

We ask a lot from our volunteer mentors. Two years, offering approximately 2 hours per week.

We ask a lot because our young people need a consistent and stable mentor who will help them to discover who they are by building them up and helping them to navigate new experiences. We ask a lot because our young people deserve the very best.

How it works

Friendship Works supports children and young people (aged 5 – 18) as well as care experienced young adults (aged 18-25) living in London. It aims to:

• improve children and young people’s social and emotional development through access to quality friendships – developing a greater ability to understand, manage and express feelings whilst making and maintaining positive relationships and attachments,

• enable children and young people to view themselves in a more positive way, providing a stronger sense of identify and an increased resilience – improving self-esteem, confidence and sense of self control, and

• broaden young people’s horizons through access to new opportunities – having more fun, exploring new hobbies, interests and talents.

Our mentoring model looks to build long-term, positive friendships between the young person and their mentor. Positive relationships have been proven to support the development of physical and emotional wellbeing and build resilience.

Research has shown that for young people, the most significant impact of a mentoring relationship occurs after 12 months. Therefore, we ask our volunteers to commit to meeting their young mentee on three weekends out of four, for at least two years.

Referrals

Referral to our Core Service (ages 5 – 18) are currently closed. Please keep an eye on the website for when we reopen to new referrals. We are still accepting referrals for the Care Experienced Service (ages 18 – 25).

To refer a child or young person please complete the relevant referral forms, or, for more information, please email the Friendship Works Service. The forms can be completed by a professional, parent or carer. If you are a young person, and you would like to self-refer, please drop us an email.

Note: we only accept referrals for young people aged 5 to 16 at the point of referral (to allow for the two years of mentoring) or, for young adults that have experienced care or hold refugee status, aged 18 to 23 at point of referral (to allow for the two years of mentoring).