About a dozen mentors and mentees in the SMILES (Southcoast Mentoring Initiative for Learning, Education and Service) mentoring program, a program of People, Incorporated (PI), meet each Monday afternoon during the school year at the Kuss Middle School. Weekly SMILES mentoring sessions take place throughout the year at different schools to offer mentors and mentees the chance to get to form strong bonds designed to keep mentees invested in their schools. The program was developed by PI in 2003 in response to the high dropout rate based on research that identified mentoring as the most effective strategy to keep at-risk students in school through graduation. SMILES recruits adult volunteers who commit to supporting, guiding and being a friend to a yound person for a period of at least one school year for an hour a week. Click here here, and here for photos from of other sessions at the Kuss Middle School. Anyone interested in learning more about SMILES should go to the website or contact contact SMILES Program Coordinator Aaron Hubley at 508-679-5233.

(Top row) SMILES Site Leader Julie Cardinali holds a well-padded egg that Maddy Tibou and her three year long mentor, Travelers Claims Professional Dawn Christensen, worked on to keep it from breaking before dropping it to the ground. They also competed together against other mentors and mentees in a spoon race to see who could quickly carry a raw egg without dropping it. (Row two) Maddie works on a life-size drawing of herself while Dawn helps her work. (Row three) Dawn and Maddy watch as another mentor and mentee build a tower made from soda straws. (Bottom row) Dawn and other mentors participate in other group activities with Maddy and the ten other mentees.