Abstract
Mentorship is a critical subject that has been founded to be the baseline behind good morals among youths today. While different theoretical constructs have been postulated to explain the concept of mentorship to the youths, a lot is yet to be exploited in this learning dynamics. On the other hand violence is antisocial habit that is associated with youths, and its manifestation has ravaged the social fabrics of the society. Thus, a cross-learning integration between a mentor and a mentee determines the formidable correlation and impacts that mentorship program is likely to trigger. Besides, the lessons that a mentee learns from a mentor is not only important in the social work practice, but it is also critical to the development and advancement of the mentor’s career. This literature review is anchored in giving various views and lenses that social work depends on the mentorship prospects. This is thus the core precept of mentorship in mitigating youth violence.
Mentoring Strategies on Youths as Fundamental Social Work Practice
The training in the field of social work is anchored on the role of a mentor, and as such the degree of mentorship that is adopted within the practice. Therefore, the roles that a mentor plays in the social work practice is indicative of the success attributed to the entire social work practice, and this is notwithstanding the fact that personal relationship between the mentor and mentee is critical to the prospect of the social work. This essay with cover the concept of adult mentorship, among other elements that play fundamental precepts in the parlance of mentorship in as far as social work practice is concerned.
Adult Mentoring in Social Work Practices
The idea behind mentorship has been coined around the role spearheaded by adults into the life of young people. This lens is steadfast on a fact created around mentorship between the adolescents and the old, through this correlation. According to Horner, et al (2010), a formidable relationship spurred by an elder to a young person has the capability of changing the violent habits of young person. Thus, the authors preclude that mentorship spurred at an early age to a child could have a significant impact in changing his or her future habit and behaviors. In addition, most societies have been in the latest rush to secure its youthful population against rot and moral decay, and are actively entrenching positive programs that would secure its youths and younger generation against social rot and decay. The popularity of these mentorship programs have been intensified due to a significant rise in the moral decay of the society.
Adult mentorship was a traditional notion, which precluded that an old man would be wiser, and his council would spearhead and spur positive growth in young person. Horner, et, al (2010), reiterate that such kind of relationship kept the social fabrics intact, thus generating positive morals in the younger generation. This is the precept of mentorship that modern day mentorship has followed, and it actively encourages positive relationship emanating between adult and the young people. Indeed, the society can never go wrong when it brings closer the younger population with the older generation. This mix invokes the most perfect correlation and interaction. Since adolescence is a critical age in the development of a young person, closer look should be geared towards his life at this stage, and this is where adult mentorship plays a fundamental role in shaping up the life of youth. Adult mentorship comes in various forms, and often occurs voluntarily, where adults offer guidance, emotional support, and encouragement to the young people. The manifestation of this positive correlation into the life of a young person invokes good morals, and hence spurs positive behaviors in the life of an adolescent.
Risk Factors among the Youths
Social work entails defining the risk factors in which youths are predisposed, and giving appropriate mentorship intervention to help curb out the habit. According to Gebo, et al (2012), risk factors are the predisposing circumstances to violence among youths, who are experiencing their age of adolescence. According to In Tilleczek, et al, (2013), violence among the youths is something that begins from a very tender age of a young person, and grows exponentially over time. In addition, the author posits that the violence manifests after a youth has been subjected to several risk factors with his or her environment. Researchers have established a rough of factors that trigger violence among youths, and these factors are coincidental to another. Thus, these factors have been established as the core generative factors to myriads of mayhems that impinge the youthful generation. On the other hand, the social work practice stipulates that mentorship ability should be directed towards youths at their prime age in order to thwart the realization of negative habits that come along their age. Some of the predisposed risk factors to youth violence include, lack of stronger social ties in families, anti-social, and delinquent peers, joining of gang groups, and engagement in various forms of delinquencies. Environmental factors too facilitate the involvement of youths into gang groups.
Theoretical construct to Facilitating Youth Mentorship
There are several theories that support youth mentorship programs, and how these programs work in rectifying the behaviors of such youths. Attachment theory is deemed to be the pioneer of theoretical constructs that have positively worked in correcting the behaviors of youths. Smith, et al, (2008), define the action of attachment theory as a baseline foundation that a child gets with an influential family member. Thus, the psychological bond that a child gets from a parent is critical to his future behaviors.
Positive attachment that a child gets from a caregiver is critical to his upbringing, and it specifically spurs self-esteem to a child. In fact, the authors reiterate that the positive attachment that child gest is fundamental to his ability to resists pressures during times of turmoil. This theory is fully conformal with the fundamentals of the adult mentorship, which posits that the adult ego plays a substantial role in generating positive behaviors in a child. The influence that a child gets form an adult is key to ensuring that he meets the social obligation as an upright citizen.
In conclusion, the topic of mentorship has covered a rough of issues that affect the wellbeing of youths, both present and in their future lives. Adult mentorship is the cornerstone to spurring positive behaviors in children, and this is entwined with the attachment theory, which is developed upon having stronger and positive hooks of morality at childhood.
References
Gebo, E., & Bond, B. J. (2012). Looking beyond suppression: Community strategies to reduce gang violence. Lanham [Md.: Lexington Books.
Horner, N., & Krawczyk, S. (2010). Social Work in Education and Children's Services. Exeter: Learning Matters Ltd.
In Tilleczek, K. C., In Ferguson, H. B., & Hospital for Sick Children. (2013). Youth, education, and marginality: Local and global expressions.
Smith, N. L., & Brandon, P. R. (2008). Fundamental issues in evaluation. New York: Guilford Press.
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