Difference An Hour Can Make, The: An Early Outcome Study of Big Brothers Big Sisters of South Africa

Difference An Hour Can Make, The: An Early Outcome Study of Big Brothers Big Sisters of South Africa

Report prepared by Johann Louw (PhD)

For Research & Evaluation Services cc



Big Brothers Big Sisters (BBBS) South Africa is affiliated to Big Brothers Big Sisters America. The international organisation's mission is to promote and support the development of Big Brothers Big Sisters programmes as independent affiliates, via which the programme matches unrelated adult volunteers with at-risk youth, from 10-16. These are community-based programme, but are delivered to individuals. The programme does not take youth out of their communities, but identifies activity goals for each individual, and develops individual case plans. The expectation is that a caring and supportive relationship will develop between the adult and the youth, and that such a relationship will act as a protective influence to youth who can be considered “at-risk” by virtue of individual and/or environmental circumstances. Volunteers and youth agree to meet two to four times per month for at least one year, thus on average for 2-4 hours per month. The relationship that is formed during this time creates the framework through which the volunteer can support the youth in his/her development.

Executive summary

In this report, evidence is presented about the effectiveness of the Big Brothers Big Sisters of South Africa programme in its first two years of existence. This is quite early in the life of the programme to talk about its effectiveness, but all stakeholders felt that even preliminary indications of effectiveness would be helpful to the programme. To be fair to the programme, the evaluation had to find a way to determine effectiveness that would acknowledge the programme's developmental phase, and not judge it as if it were a long established programme with large numbers of participants.

The solution was to employ three strategies to answer the question about effectiveness:

• Examine the infrastructure created, to establish whether it would enable the programme to deliver its services in sufficient strength.
• Use certain benchmarks of quality in terms of characteristics of the youth, the match and the relationship established - if those benchmarks are reached, it is reasonable to assume that the projected changes in behaviour and attitude will follow.
• Explore whether changes occurred in the behaviour and attitudes of participants.

The study utilized a number of qualitative and quantitative methods for collecting the data: visits to the programme offices and with mentors and Littles; interviews with programme staff and parents/guardians of Littles; inspection of programme documentation; attendance of meetings of Advisory Board and Board of Trustees; and attendance of some training sessions.

To try and answer the main evaluation question, about changes in behaviour and attitudes, 42 Littles were interviewed prior to commencing a mentoring relationship, and some way into the relationship. Although the study sample was necessarily small, three groups were constructed, in terms of how much exposure they had to the programme. The first group of nine Littles received the full programme treatment, namely 12 months or more of mentoring, meeting once a week for one hour. The second group received an intermediate level of programme treatment, and the third group received no treatment or virtually no treatment because they were on a waiting list. This third group therefore can be considered to be the control group in design terms. Six broad areas were chosen to see whether mentoring would make a difference: antisocial activities; academic performance, attitudes and behaviours; relationships with family; relationships with friends; self-concept; and social and cultural enrichment. The instruments we used to measure these variables were made available to us by Public/Private Ventures of Philadelphia.

The major findings were:

Infrastructure

The programme has managed to put in place a strong infrastructure in a short space of time. Appropriate bodies to provide oversight and advice have been established, and are functioning well. Nine people have been appointed to administer the programme. Funding is adequate, although always tenuous.

Without volunteers, the programme would not exist. In a difficult climate to attract volunteers, the programme managed to reach nearly 2000 people. Of these, 596 applied, and so far 314 have been trained, with 227 already screened and waiting to commences training in February 2003. Screening procedures are in place, and working well. The programme instituted plans to keep the volunteers involved in the programme, once they have been trained. The BBBS of America's training manual served as a basis for training the volunteers, and an adapted training programme is delivered in South Africa. The number of enquiries, applications, volunteers trained, and matches made, has increased substantially from 2001 to 2002.

Large numbers of youth have been attracted to the programme, via a network of contacts in schools and children's homes. It would appear as if a steady supply of youth would never be a problem, as there are currently more youth referred than the programme can match, hence the existence of a waiting list. All indications are that the appropriate youth are attracted into the programme, although there are some that are younger than 10 years and some that are older than 16 years, which are the typical ages included in the American programme. The only cautionary note one can make here is with regard to juvenile offenders, who are part of the Diversion programme.

Matches are the medium through which the programme attempts to bring about changes. In 2002 alone 150 matches have been made, and these are supervised in line with the guidelines set by the international body.

Benchmarks of quality

The programme met and at times exceeded the international benchmarks of quality for:

• Length of the relationship;
• Frequency of meeting; and
• Quality of the relationship.

This means that the relationships lasted as long as they should have, and that Littles and mentors met as often as was required by the programme guidelines. In terms of the relationships established, it meant that there was no sense of disappointment on the part of the Little in the mentor and the relationship, that the relationship was perceived as youth-centred, and that youths were emotionally engaged in the relationship.

Changes in behaviour and attitudes

Although caution must be exercised in interpreting these quantitative results, given the low numbers in two of the groups, the following significant differences emerged:

• Overall, none of the groups changed for the worse within the 12 months of observation

.

• All three groups, irrespective of the amount of mentoring, reduced their involvement in actions that led to damage to property.
• All three groups increased the amount of time they spent in cultural and social activities.
• All three groups had an increased sense that they could communicate with a degree of intimacy with their peers.
• All three groups had an increased sense of mastery and coping in terms of their self- concepts.
• The group who received no mentoring, remained lowest in terms of the value they attach to school.
• The group who received most mentoring improved more than the other two groups in terms of the emotional support they receive from their peers, and significantly reduced the amount of conflict they experienced with their peers.

Quality of the relationships

In a separate small-scale study we tried to identify different characteristics of the relationships that are established between mentors and Littles. Two quite different styles of mentoring were identified: one characterised by an account of "help"; the other by "friendship for its own sake". Tentative findings from this part of the evaluation support earlier research: that relationships characterised by "friendship for its own sake" are perceived more positively by both mentors and Littles, and could be more effective than when a "helping" attitude is taken. A key underlying factor in these differences may be the more active role that Littles play in "friendship" relationships. The part of the programme that could take a closer look at these findings, refers to the training of mentors.

The community-based diversion programme

The NICRO matches were not successful: of the nine, eight were closed. For various reasons, these youth may not be the most appropriate target group for a BBBS-type mentoring programme. In the second group of matches, BBBS of South Africa have introduced steps to try and improve the situation, and time will tell if these bear fruit. This may or may not change the programme to the extent that it no longer resembles the original programme content. What is clear though is that BBBS of South Africa will have to re-examine continuously its involvement in these programmes.

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Source: BBBS International website