VENTURA COUNTY — Big Brothers Big Sisters of Ventura County (BBSVC) is celebrating 50 years of mentor programs in 2020! To kick off the agency’s landmark anniversary year, BBSVC is celebrating National Mentoring Month by taking over Ventura County’s favorite Starbucks. Through the month of January, anyone interested in becoming a volunteer mentor to a young person who is facing adversity is invited to connect with BBSVC: the organization is hosting pre-scheduled coffee meetups, or can meet with interested volunteers one-on-one. However you connect with BBSVC to talk about applying to be a mentor, the coffee is BBSVC’s treat!
To make connecting with BBSVC easy, interested volunteers can text the codeBBSVC to 51555. Doing so will give them the opportunity to select how they would like to be contacted, and how they would like to meet up for coffee.
“Our #CoffeeWithABig meetups were a great success last year, and we want to go even bigger for 2020. We are hosting meetups every Saturday and Sunday in January – It’s a call to coffee-enthusiasts across the county,” says BBSVC CEO, Lynne West. “There are over 100 youth in Ventura County waiting for a mentor, and we want people to imagine the impact they can make when they do something as easy as share a latte with a Little. When you’re matched with a mentee, it’s not about changing your schedule, it’s about sharing who you are. But mentors usually find that their life – and the life of their Little – is changed for the better along the way.”
BBSVC is looking for volunteers who are interested in getting started as a Big and continuing as a mentor for at least one year. “I finally decided that if I wanted to really make a difference, I needed to just take the leap and do it,” says Greg, a Big/mentor with BBSVC, in describing his decision to volunteer.
All of the Littles on the BBSVC waitlist are primarily from single-parent homes, foster or kinship care, or a home that lacks two positive role models. Over 70% of the youth on the BBSVC waitlist are boys. All of the children on the BBSVC waitlist have the need for a mentor to step in as a friend and role model at this time in their lives, and are looking forward to being a part of the program. BBSVC invites all role models in Ventura County who want to make a difference in 2019 (and beyond) to apply to be a BIG.
Anyone interested in becoming a mentor or finding BBSVC’s next meetup may visit www.BBSVC.org/MENTOR, or may contact Danica Selvaggio at dselvaggio@bbsvc.org or 805.484.2282.
About Big Brothers Big Sisters of Ventura County: Big Brothers Big Sisters of Ventura County (BBSVC) has been connecting Bigs and Littles in professionally-supported, one-to-one mentoring relationships in Ventura County and neighboring communities since 1970. Facilitating more than 1,500 mentoring matches annually between community or school-based volunteers and youth ages 6-21 years old, BBSVC is committed to bringing their life-changing program to every child in Ventura County who needs it. BBSVC is an independent 501(c)3 nonprofit organization that depends on private donors for 75% of its funding.