Work with Diverse Teenage Children-Health Mentors Open House

Work with Diverse Teenage Children as a Health Mentor with MIKE Program_Volunteer or Academic Field Placement/Internship

To Learn more:  Attend an informal information session June 18, 2009 from 5-7:30 PM at an Open House at the MIKE Program office 9155 SW Barnes Road Ste, 221, Portland, 97225. (free parking or just up the street from the Sunset Transit on MAX  or Trimet Bus #20 stops at the building at Providence St. Vincent’s Health Center

Or visit:

About:  www.mikeprogram.org

Contact:  [email protected] or 503-296-7705

Develop cultural engagement skills and enhance behavioral and social science service skills serving as a caring adult in a group of diverse teenage children engaged in MIKE Program in the Portland Metro area. MIKE Program--Multicultural Integrated Kidney Education Program-- is a community non-profit organization serving in the Portland Metro area.  Our mission is to empower youth to be ambassadors of health in service to their diverse communities through mentorship, partnership, and the promotion of healthy kidneys. We act as guides to promote healthy behaviors and decrease risky behavior in order to decrease the incidence of obesity, diabetes, hypertension, and risky behaviors, with a strong emphasis on promoting social and emotional health, since all factor into kidney failure.

MIKE Program is a youth empowerment program that places health mentors together with teen groups to enrich project-based service learning in teen classrooms or youth agencies.  The teacher or case manager facilitates group process and navigates site requirements while employing the MIKE Program curriculum to bring the teens and mentors together in a partnership of inquiry and action.

Training starts this service learning opportunity and will include aspects of the MIKE Program curriculum, which meets national and state standards for comprehensive adolescent health education, Career Related Learning Skills, and best practices of youth development and adolescent health education. 

You will learn and experience group theory as you serve throughout the entirety of one youth group project.  Projects may start either in October or January, extending through the end of the following semester or the entire high school year. Projects typically are geared toward the academic schedule and thus do not meet during typical holiday breaks, except that youth groups typically participate in Martin Luther King Jr. Day, usually in the morning. Typical time with youth is 1.5-2 hours, meeting one (or if a tailored experience, more) days a week, either in-school time or after school.  Add travel time and short preparation time, occasional field trips with youth on weekends or extended class time, and bi-monthly booster training sessions.

No medical background required. However, in the words of Albert Schweitzer:  “Example is not the main thing in influencing others; it is the only thing.” Many of the young people you will serve are facing socio-economic challenges and developmental interruptions. It is imperative that once placed in a MIKE Program youth group mentors honor the youths’ need for caring, responsible, and consistent adult role models.

Contact [email protected] or through the web at www.mikeprogram.org

or call 503 29607705

Cheryl Neal, M.D., President_MIKE Program*

9155 SW Barnes Road, Suite 221

Mailing_PO Box 91194_Portland,OR_97291

T_Office:(503) 296-7705_Fax:(503)216-2594

Direct:(503) 629-5848  Mobile: (503) 421-6574 

<www.mikeprogram.org>

Reach Up, Reach Out, Reach Back

* 2008 Multnomah County Public Health Hero