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You Can Mentor is a network that equips and encourages mentors and mentoring leaders through resources and relationships to love God, love others, and make disciples in their own community. We want to see Christian mentors thrive.
We want to hear from you! Send any mentoring questions to hello@youcanmentor.com, and we'll answer them on our podcast. We want to help you become the best possible mentor you can be. Also, if you are a mentoring organization, church, or non-profit, connect with us to join our mentoring network or to be spotlighted on our show.
Please find out more at www.youcanmentor.com or find us on social media. You will find more resources on our website to help equip and encourage mentors. We have downloadable resources, cohort opportunities, and an opportunity to build relationships with other Christian mentoring leaders.
You can mentor is a podcast about the power of building relationships with kids from hard places in the name of Jesus. Every episode will help you overcome common mentoring obstacles and give you the confidence you need to invest into the lives of others. Find out more at youcanmentor.com or find us on social media. You can mentor. What up, mentors?
Speaker 1:Hey. I'm here to talk to you about the mentoring leadership summit, April 21 through the twenty fourth in Colorado Springs, Colorado. This summit is designed for mentoring leaders, people who might feel stretched thin, isolated, unsure of what to do with staff, volunteers, fundraising, all that stuff. We designed this summit for you. It's not just a conference, but it's a time for you to be surrounded with mentoring leaders, people who love Jesus, love mentoring.
Speaker 1:You step away from the daily grind. You get refreshed so that you can go back to your community and you can pour out. More importantly, the whole event is created to help you build relationships with other mentoring leaders so that you can learn, you can figure out how to have long term impact, and stay encouraged and equipped so you can mentor for the long haul. You'll experience deep connection with other mentoring leaders through shared meals, intentional conversations. We have a lot of downtime built into the schedule where you can just hang out with other mentoring people.
Speaker 1:We got breakout sessions led by experienced mentoring executives and ministry leaders, and they will equip you with best practices, new ideas, and things that you can take home to become a better mentoring leader. We've got worship and prayer. We've got hikes up in the mountains of Colorado. Easy ones. Don't worry.
Speaker 1:They're easy. But we want you to leave reconnected with God, spiritually renewed, and connected to other people. Guys, it's really hard to do this mentoring thing alone. And at the summit, you will gain new friends, you'll gain support, you'll gain clarity and confidence as you get new ideas, and it's our goal for you to walk away with a renewed passion and energy to continue mentoring kids from hard places in the name of Jesus. So sign up today.
Speaker 1:Go to our website, youcanmentor.com, and check out the summit, April in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Bring your directors, program leaders, your staff members. Let's do it. You can mentor. Come to the summit.
Speaker 1:Guys, it's in Colorado. Come on. Come on now. You can mentor. Sign up today.
Speaker 1:Bring a friend. Tell your friends. Let's do it. What up, mentors? Today on the pod, I'm excited to welcome Dina Petty, the founder and executive director of Mentors Care.
Speaker 1:It's a not for profit that's been changing the trajectory of high school students all across North Texas since 2009. Mentors Care exists to connect at risk students with consistent, caring adult mentors who meet with them weekly on public school campuses, helping them stay in school, graduate, and step into a hopeful future. What started as a small grassroots effort has grown into a powerful school based mentoring model, serving hundreds of students across multiple high schools with remarkable outcomes. I think she's in over 25 high schools all across Texas. Dina is also an inspiring speaker and author, and she's just about to release her upcoming book called Collateral Hope.
Speaker 1:It's a deeply personal memoir of her own journey through hardship, faith, healing, and discovering purpose, which is the very heart of why she started Mentor's Care in the first place. I hope you enjoyed this podcast. Share it with your mentoring friends, your staff, your volunteers. It's a great episode about leadership, mentorship, resilience, and the hope that fuels this work of introducing kids to Jesus by way of mentoring. Excited for Dina.
Speaker 1:Enjoy. Remember, you can mentor. How's it going? Welcome to the you can mentor podcast. I'm here with my friend, miss Dina Petty.
Speaker 1:Dina, say hello.
Speaker 2:Hi. How are doing, Zach? Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1:Oh, thank you so much for hopping on the podcast. Super excited to get to hear about you and your story and all that's going on. So
Speaker 2:I'm honored that you're interested. So
Speaker 1:Well, thank you so much. So I I first found out about you, and I don't even know if I've told you about this or not, but people have been telling me that I have to meet you, and they've been saying it for probably two, three, four, five years now. Like, man, you have got to because aren't you up in Midlothian area? Is Yes. Isn't that right?
Speaker 1:Yeah. And people are just like, man, there's this thing going on up there. You have to find out about it. So super excited to get to hear about you and about Mentor's Care. And so why don't you just open us up and just tell us about you and your family and Sure.
Speaker 1:Who who you are?
Speaker 2:Well, it's cool that you're in Waco because my son played for Baylor. He was the quarterback there, Bryce Petty. And so we have yep. So we have strong ties there. You know, a lot of good memories, and that was just an awesome time when he was playing.
Speaker 2:And so when you said you were in Waco, I was like, oh, that warms my heart. But, yeah, my story's kinda crazy how I got started like a lot of people. And I know a lot of people had had it a lot worse than me or have it a lot worse than me, but it is my story and it is what fueled the start of Mentor's Care, how this all came about is I would have given anything to have had mentor, somebody in my life when I was growing up. I had very dysfunctional family. My dad was in a lot of illegal things, a lot of suspecting of mafia dealings.
Speaker 2:He had a lot of mafia friends. And this was in Louisiana. And then my mom was in a cult religion. And so it's very unusual childhood to say the least. So my dad was never really home much growing up, and my mom was not emotionally well.
Speaker 2:She so I don't remember them ever saying they love me or hug me. Nobody woke me up for school. Nobody checked a report card. So by the time I was in high school, which because of the religion, didn't have any friends in school. I was just legally supposed to go to school, and I'm just barely getting by.
Speaker 2:I missed as many days as I could. I I was a horrible student. I didn't engage. I didn't get in trouble or anything. Just teachers are like, what are you doing here?
Speaker 2:You know? I was really annoying to teachers because I didn't participate, but I couldn't. But they didn't know that. So it was very hard growing up. And then when I was 16, my mother and father divorced.
Speaker 2:Shocker. Because, you know, it really was a bad marriage. And but she truly lost her mind then, my mother. And when she did, she was very cruel times two. She was already a cruel mother, and then it just got worse.
Speaker 2:And there was a moment in time when I kinda made up my mind, okay. I gotta figure out how to get out of this, how to get out of here. And I was already having questions because I didn't know who Jesus Christ was. I really didn't. Because in a cult religion, why do you need Jesus?
Speaker 2:It's your works that are gonna get you saved. So it didn't make sense. And then this man, Jesus, though, was so appealing because he said things like, all you need to do is love God with your whole heart, soul, and mind, and strength, then love your neighbor as yourself. And then the laws are fulfilled. And I was like, but what are okay.
Speaker 2:What are we doing here? Because there's so many laws and guidelines and things we have to do that I just could never measure up, and I was always in trouble. And so that and and then he said, my yoke is light. Well, life was hard. I was guilt ridden my whole life.
Speaker 2:It was just full of guilt all the time. And you weren't supposed to love people. You're supposed to convert people. And instead of loving them right where they are, you were judging every person you meet, and you're trying to get them to come on your side doing what you're doing. And if you're not doing that, you're not being a good cult person.
Speaker 2:So it came to a head. I was already having all those questions, but then when I was 16, I came home from school one day, and there was a note on the counter. She was always and she wasn't And the note said, Satan had one that she was going to have to kill herself, but first kill her children. Well, that set in motion, okay. First of all, where is she?
Speaker 2:Is she in this house? I don't know where she is. Called my dad and just just so happened he was in the country. He was always gone. He was never around.
Speaker 2:But he answered. And he came and he said, alright. Well, looks like she's in another state. Just take care of your brother. And he left and didn't take care of us.
Speaker 2:I was 16. She came home after a few days or whatever. But in that time, I made up my mind. I'm gonna get out of here, but I don't know how. Well, this is the eighties.
Speaker 2:We weren't supposed to go to college. We were just supposed to marry other cult people and have cult babies. So I graduated. I started teaching myself how to hang wallpaper. And so I started hanging wallpaper that summer, and then I finally just said, I can't do this anymore, and I walked away.
Speaker 2:And the only place I could go was in my car. So I stayed in my car that summer, and I had met my future husband. And he went to Louisiana Tech University, and I went, I think I wanna go. Had no background or training or anything for it, but I had saved enough money. And back then, it was $600 to pay your tuition to go for one quarter.
Speaker 2:And I moved everything I had in a milk crate and a pillowcase and moved into my dorm room. And I started and I was a horrible student, but I was so in love with Todd who I've been married to now for almost thirty nine years. And anyway, the journey began for me. My mom disowned me. She said to never call again.
Speaker 2:I never spoke to my mom or my brothers. My dad was off doing his thing. So I was on my own. But the journey started and it was hard. I mean, I remember times of being hungry.
Speaker 2:I remember being fearful that I don't know how I'm gonna get to work because I have a bald tire, a flat tire and three bald tires, breaking down on the side of the road in Louisiana on Whiskey Bay, which is nothing but a bridge for 40 miles or whatever it is, 30 miles, and trucks zooming by. There's nobody to call. He didn't have cell phones. I mean, it was just a journey of just survival, you know, and I was just so on my own. And I do remember a really dark moment, and it was a moment when I remember thinking, if I died, there's not a person that's gonna mourn my death.
Speaker 2:And that was the loneliest I've ever felt in my life. And I think there's some people out there that can relate to that. If there's nothing else they can relate to, I think they can relate to that. So my story, I tell it, and I've written my book, Collateral Hope. We're gonna launch it March 12.
Speaker 2:I'm gonna have a book signing in Midlothian. It's all the story that brings me to where I am now. The purpose of the story, the purpose of me telling my story is because we have to encourage loving one another. We have to encourage being open to hear the story of another person, what's really going on. Nobody asked me why I wasn't showing up to school.
Speaker 2:Nobody asked me, you seem smart, but you're not turning in work. You have talents. Why aren't you getting involved in anything? Nobody asked me. And I think that's the message is that we have to truly be open to wanna know who the other person is, who you are truly, and truly be invested.
Speaker 2:And I think that's the gospel is that you matter so much to God that he gave his only begotten son for you. So how can we not get to know each and every individual human being that Jesus died for? And if they're misbehaving or acting out, there's usually a reason. There's something going on. Well, long story.
Speaker 2:It brings me all the way to Midlothian. In 2009, I had been a youth pastor, and we had our two kids. They're doing great. We moved to Texas. Bryce is doing great in football.
Speaker 2:I'm helping him with his recruiting and all that kind of thing. And I'm volunteering at the high school. And the principal said to me, would you be interested in starting a mentoring program? And I went, that is what I need to be doing. I mean, it just resonated instantly because there were people who came into my life along the way.
Speaker 2:They were truly kind to me. They really did lean in and look me in the eye and ask questions that I had never had before. And I thought, oh my goodness. Yes. Be intentional about the very thing that I really needed growing up.
Speaker 2:That's beautiful. I'd love to be a part of that. So, you know, the principal and the superintendent said, yeah, we tried to start a mentoring program, and it always would fall apart. And I said, I wanna do this. And so I wrote up a program.
Speaker 2:I wrote up curriculum based upon my life, and it's all the things it's called 24 talking points now. It's all the things we can't assume kids should know. And what we have found is I'm bouncing around. Right now, about 80% of our students do not know the simple lessons a parent would be teaching. They just don't know.
Speaker 2:Like, showing up is half the battle. Giving a 120% when no one's looking, nobody's teaching them that. Talking about a future. What do you wanna do in the future? All those things are based upon my life story that nobody ever taught me those things.
Speaker 2:Had to learn through hard knocks, the school of hard knocks, being a parent, and then being a youth pastor. So I started it. And they said, if you could get if you could get five mentors, that would be amazing. So the first year I started, we got 30. The next year, it was 40.
Speaker 2:Then it was 55. And it kept growing, and it was phenomenal. It was very intentional. I learned a lot from looking at some other nonprofits that were great nonprofits, but why did they why did they struggle and why did they fail? And so I tried to implement the things I felt like were so important, like equipping the mentors with the talking points, training them, having a full time person at the school, making sure that they're meeting.
Speaker 2:And if they can't meet, let's reschedule. I'll do all that. I'll do it all. You just show up and be a friend. Because, okay, as a youth pastor, you know, what is the role in ministry?
Speaker 2:You really affect five to 10 people close to you. Beyond that, you're really not connecting. Well, mentoring one to one is making sure every single person is connecting. Because that's what I realized when I was a youth pastor. There were so many kids that felt overlooked or you play favorites.
Speaker 2:It wasn't that at all. It's just you can't be all that you wanna be for that many people. So what I found is that there are so many great people in the community that love the Lord, wanna serve, realize there's a issue out there. These kids are lost, but I don't know how to connect with them. I don't know how to get to them.
Speaker 2:They're not coming to our churches. Well, the schools are saying, we have a whole issue of students that are really struggling. They're not showing up. They're not doing their work, risky behaviors, very disrespectful. And we're trying to teach them reading, writing, and arithmetic.
Speaker 2:That's not what they need right now. So the schools are saying, please come help us. And then you have really great people that realize, I wanna do something. I can mentor one hour once a week. I can do that.
Speaker 2:We match them, and then the magic happens. You start seeing these students' lives turning around.
Speaker 1:So, man, you know, there's so much there to unpack. I absolutely love your story. And I think the first kinda saying that comes to mind is that you have turned your pain and turned it into your passion. And Yeah. I just think that that reminds me of in the book of Genesis where God says, you know, what the enemy meant for evil, I turned to good.
Speaker 1:And I just think that it's an upside down kinda kingdom. Right? It's like, I mean, some of us have experienced these issues in life coming from our childhood, from our parents, and we are actually called here to become what we never had as parents and to create the kinds of childhoods for kids who were just like us that we never got to experience. But I wanna you said something about this love versus convert, and I wanna hit pause there because it might not be convert. Maybe it's love versus good grades or love versus going to college.
Speaker 1:Right? Like and I think we all can sit here and say, like, putting your faith and hope in Jesus Christ is a good thing. Going to college is a good thing. Getting good grades and academic success and success on the sports fields. All of those are good things.
Speaker 1:But tell me more about how us as mentors, how we can make sure that we are coming in first with love instead of with an agenda.
Speaker 2:Man, it is so important. It is so important. You gotta meet people right where they are, right then, and not judging them. Because we have a whole generation of students right now. For my generation, it's like, what are you doing?
Speaker 2:This doesn't make any sense at all. It's not our place to figure it out. It's our place to love them right where they are. And how many times have I had mentors say, wow, I had this child that's a trans, or it's a gay student, and this was really hard for me to do this. But, man, I started meeting with them, and we just we just loved each other.
Speaker 2:And I just saw a child of God that is very confused, that is really struggling or was abused. And so therefore, they are confused. And you just love them right where they are. Every person starves to be loved right where they are given the benefit of the doubt. For instance, when I would act out in any way whatsoever, why didn't anybody find out why?
Speaker 2:You know? Give me the benefit of the doubt. Find out why I did what I did. And I think every person longs for that. Please understand me where I was coming from.
Speaker 2:I made a mistake, but, you know, I'm not I'm not worthy of your condemnation. I am I am worthy of your love. And what I have seen over the years of just loving a student right where they are, it just melts them. I think about the scripture. It's like heaping coals upon their head.
Speaker 2:You know, it's not to hurt them. It actually softens steel. And that's, you know, what we're doing. I know that the scriptures talk about our enemies, and that they're not our enemies, but but it is like keeping coals upon their head when you love them. And then also, perfect love casts out all fear.
Speaker 2:If you're fearing a student that you don't understand where they're coming from and it scares you to death, if you just come in love, it casts out all fear. You're just seeing a a child of God and loving them right where they are.
Speaker 1:And I think I think one thing that is so important is as we think about our kids. Right? Like, the environment that we were raised in is long gone, and Mhmm. Kids today are facing just just a kind of a different form of obstacles. I mean, whether it's technology or, you know, gender identity, confusion, peer pressure.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. I mean, all of these things. And I think the I think for me, it's easy to look out and be like, man, there is no hope. But what I love is the name of your book, Collateral Hope. And how how can we as mentors insert hope into the lives of these kiddos?
Speaker 1:And, also, just what is hope in the eyes of a teenager?
Speaker 2:They want real, and they want truth. And they're being fed a lot of lies, so they're hungry. And I think we innately, as God's children, recognize truth and recognize hope. And it's almost like all these kids, you know, they're down like this in their phones. And there was a study done before COVID, video before and after, and it was a study done after COVID.
Speaker 2:But anyway, the video before was showing students getting off the bus, and it showed the girls, you know, kinda giggling and, you know, laughing with one another, and they're talking and walking together. The guys get off the bus. They're pushing each other, laughing, and tackling, like boys, you know, rough housing or whatever, and just just talking and laughing and having fun. After COVID, every student that got off the bus did this individually, isolation. You just wanna pick their head up and you just wanna say, look.
Speaker 2:Look. Look. Look at me in the eye. That's what every human soul is longing for is for real interaction, leaning in eye to eye. I am hearing you.
Speaker 2:I see that you're alive. I see that you're a person. That phone is such a lie to these kids. I've I've given that speech many times to the kids, and I'm like I'm like, look, I am 60 years old. I see social media too.
Speaker 2:Okay? And I'm on it some because I have to do it. Don't like it, but I have to do it. I see people on there my age, they're showing pictures of their vacations, just bought a new car. Their marriage and their family life looks amazing.
Speaker 2:They're having so much fun. I know them, and I know they're in so much debt that they fight all the time about the money. I know that vacation was really about three years ago. It wasn't recent. They just hadn't posted that picture yet.
Speaker 2:And I know the arguments that they're all having. So what is real is not being portrayed. It's all a lie. If we don't if we don't take that opportunity to meet with them one on one where we can look them in the eye and tell them what truth is, they will not have hope. If they see a person meeting with them every week with that person and no one else for no other reason, showing them unconditional love, I don't want anything, that brings hope.
Speaker 2:Because the rest of the world wants something. It makes them feel empty. I'm never enough. I'm never gonna add up. I'm comparing myself to this person.
Speaker 2:I compare myself to that person. I'm just thinking what an opportunity it is to be able to speak truth into kids.
Speaker 1:Speak to kids love. Mhmm. Think I read that somewhere.
Speaker 2:I never know. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Okay. So so you started at one high school with, you know Mhmm. 25 kids, turned into 50 kids, turned into and now you're in over 25 high schools and serving
Speaker 2:think it's 22. I think it's 22. If I wrote that down there wrong, I'm sorry. I think it's 22.
Speaker 1:Three of your high schools, it'll be 25 here soon. Yeah. How's that? It's okay. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Okay. So so how how do you go about going into the public schools and treating them with honor without watering down the gospel or without dishonoring what God has put on your heart?
Speaker 2:I love how you worded that, honoring the schools. Because first of all, we when we talk to the schools, when we approach them, whether they've whether they've approached us or we approach them, we come to the schools to say, we are here as an extra layer of support. We are not counselors. We're not teachers. We're not doctors.
Speaker 2:Excuse me. We're we're nothing but a friend to that student to gently guide them towards hope and a purposeful life, to help them with the future, to graduate, you know, that they need to graduate high school. So we contract with the schools. When I first started, it was, you know, all free. I wasn't paid.
Speaker 2:I shoved a desk in a broom closet and started. Well, now we have incredible staff that work at the schools full time. So that person is to be an extra layer of support to make sure the mentoring is happening, to make sure the mentor and the student is a good match, that they're meeting every week. They have updated grades that they look at to hold them accountable when not tutors, but they use the curriculum. The mentor and the student use the curriculum to keep moving them towards being successful human beings until they graduate.
Speaker 2:The schools there is a a report called the Volmer Report. It's really interesting. It's a document that was created by doctor Volmer on a study that he did the stresses and strains on schools mandated by the government. So it's the it started in the nineteen hundreds. It was 1900.
Speaker 2:There's been over a 100 since then. I think a 160, 180. I can't remember. It keeps going up all the time. Started out with students were coming to school with hygiene issues because they were immigrants and impoverished, and they didn't have access to clean running water and all that.
Speaker 2:And they wanted just them to understand the importance of hygiene. So that was mandated by the government. The schools need to teach kids that. Okay. Now it's everything.
Speaker 2:It's sex ed. It's, you know, what they think you need to be eating when really coming out of the garden is probably the best thing, but they teach all these other things. So the teachers, educators are there to teach students reading, writing, and arithmetic, few life lessons. You know, you got some great people, wisdom, teaching them. It's all great.
Speaker 2:The life lessons really should be coming from home, from mom and dad. But the families have because they've been breaking apart more and more and more, we've been handing off more and more to the government, mandating the the governments are mandating the schools to do all of these things. So what we are saying to the schools is that we wanna be that help. Y'all go teach the students. Let us start working with these kids.
Speaker 2:And I think it was I don't know if it was Mother Teresa. I can't remember. I need to look this up because I've quoted it so many times. But basically, you cannot preach the gospel to somebody that's starving. You feed them first.
Speaker 2:Same thing. You can't teach a student reading, writing, and arithmetic when their life is a mess. They're angry. They can't focus because of what's happened at home. So you need that extra layer of people that love them to talk about life.
Speaker 2:You know, let's let's find out what's going on. I wanna be your friend, intentionally being your friend. Let's walk life out together. Then we can start talking about education. And that's what we've seen so many testimonials of students that were just a wreck.
Speaker 2:And now they really are doing great. I've got one story sitting on my desk of a young man that he was in and out of trouble for year for three years before we met him, and now he's going to graduate. And he's got he's on honor roll and has seven colleges that have offered scholarships to play football and just pulled his life together because a person loved him and was meeting with him every week. And then you had that full time coordinator making sure that those meetings were happening because that meeting between that mentor and that student is vital. It is vital.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So so I have I mean, we've talked a couple times now, and you and I see eye to eye on this. The care of the mentor, the equipping of the mentor, how confident they feel, how much they're being taken care of has a direct correlation in the amount of Mhmm. Quote, unquote success that they will have in the relationship with their mentee. Do you think that you could tell me how you kinda came to that conclusion and what y'all do to best equip your mentors to mentor for the long haul?
Speaker 2:Well, like I said earlier, you know, there's some great nonprofits. And what I saw is that they did mentoring in addition to what they were doing. And so it was like, hey, here's a student, but they didn't give you any direction. They didn't give you curriculum. They didn't set it up for you.
Speaker 2:Or meeting off campus. Okay? Then that limits the amount of students you can have and how many mentors you can have because of all the background checks, which is a great program. But being at the high school during the school day with eyes on them at all times, and they are completely equipped with training, what you are, what you are not. And having a student tell you what happened in their life that week, and sometimes it's very tragic.
Speaker 2:Like, it is is really hard to hear. You're a woman, and you've got a young girl that you're mentoring. She just got raped the night before. We are not asking you as a mentor to do anything with that other than love that child, bring that information to us. We're gonna have to go report it.
Speaker 2:We'll take it from there. You know? But that is secondhand trauma for a mentor. You've gotta support that mentor with that coordinator. Let's talk it out.
Speaker 2:How are you doing? Are you doing okay? Yeah. This was, you know, all the things. Or we're not asking you when you find out a student is hungry to go find out how to help the family with food.
Speaker 2:Bring that information to us. That coordinator is kind of a social worker on the campus. And we have all the connections and relationships around that school district to get that student and that family what they need. We're just saying be a friend, and that's all. So we equip them.
Speaker 2:We do a background check. We have an application process. We work very hard. We pray over the matching of the mentor and the student, which is really cool what happens with that. Then we have the curriculum.
Speaker 2:We have a mentor guide that I co wrote with Doctor. Brittany Claiborne, who is a psychologist, who is incredible. She's actually done a TED Talk. She's an incredible lady. But so when they meet with a student, they're ready to go.
Speaker 2:They got everything that they need right there. And then if they don't know what to do, you just talk to us and let us help you. But, also, I this is all we do as mentoring. We're not anything else but mentoring. So we're gonna be excellent at this to make sure you have everything that you need to be a mentor because it is scary.
Speaker 2:And that's why I noticed when I was a youth pastor, when you would have a really critical kid doing some really, you know, wild things, it's intimidating for adults when you, you know, you're just going to church and you have a normal life, and and then you're meeting a kid that you've never experienced these things. It can be very intimidating. And, also, they act like they don't like you. They act like they don't wanna be there. That's a very normal response for a child that's been abused and had trauma is they're gonna act like they don't like you.
Speaker 2:So that coordinator is also mentoring the mentor to say, what you're doing is so important. You've gotta keep going. Your ego needs I understand you might have hurt feelings because you're a human too, but realize this is a child that's been traumatized, hurt. They're gonna reject you before you can reject them. And then expectation is set.
Speaker 2:So if you are going into mentoring because you wanna change a life, you're going into it for the wrong reasons. It's not about you. It's a calling. And then God's gonna do what God's gonna do with it, and also they have free will. But what an opportunity to speak truth into into them if for just a moment you had a moment.
Speaker 2:And and then maybe we don't get to see the fruit of that. And, you know, it might come years later. I've had that so many times. Years later, students come around and say, that meant a lot to me, and this is what I remember. And you're like, I didn't even think you knew heard any of that.
Speaker 2:You know? And you find out later they do. So you set the expectations as well.
Speaker 1:I wanna ask you a couple questions about expansion and about getting into the schools. So the first one, let's focus on getting into the schools. So do you go by way of the principal, by way of the superintendent? Like, if someone was wanting to partner with a school in their own city, what's the best way to go about doing that?
Speaker 2:Yeah. All those things. So if you are connected to a community, you feel like every school district needs Mentor's Care. They just do. And so the principal is kinda like the CEO of the company.
Speaker 2:So they need to have the buy in. We really do want this. Well, you know, 99% of them see that need. And just reach out to us. Just go to our website at mentors.care, and there's a phone number on there or email.
Speaker 2:Reach out. Help us with the meeting, to set up that meeting with the principal, the superintendent, school board person. And then we just do a presentation. We just show how it's working. And what the schools need to know is that we have data that proves it's working.
Speaker 2:So in the last four years, I think we've graduated a 100% of our students that we've had two or more years, and they were all at risk of not graduating, every one of them. That's the criteria. Disciplinary referrals decreased tremendously by us being on that on that campus. Attendance improves tremendously. I'm gonna say students that have been with us increased attendance 7076%.
Speaker 2:So we have the data that proves the results of how it's working. So with the school district, there is a partnering with us financially because it doesn't cover the entire cost of us to be on the campus. But it's it's it helps us to have a full time person on staff. All we ask for is support from the top, that they want us to be there, that they would give us a space on the school grounds there at the high school because it's the place where the mentors come in, the student comes in, they meet in a proximity around there for the hour, and then so we need that space. Other than that, it's turnkey.
Speaker 2:We do everything else. We go hire the person. We go recruit the mentors. And so our caseload at each of the high schools is between 50 to 60 mentors at each of the high school, meeting with 50 to 60 students. More than that, once you get to 70, you're starting to have heart palpitations because you're dealing with so many things that the kids are dealing with.
Speaker 2:There's too much because that coordinator is coordinating, you know, that 120 people every week plus all of the things that come out of those meetings. There's a lot. And then that coordinator is also there at the school as that extra layer because it is hard to get to the counselors, or the counselors are having to work on a lot of the academic sides of it. And our kids are the ones that are most critical that they're dealing with the more emotional issues of life usually. So, yeah, I mean, we it is our hope and our vision.
Speaker 2:It is every one of us that work for Mentors Care. We're excited about growing. We wanna go wherever God's called us. We're gonna keep going. The first year that I started it, I I didn't know what I was doing at all, but I quickly learned this is working.
Speaker 2:This is interesting. This is needed. Because when I started at Midlothian High School, I had some older folks go, why don't we have a mentoring program? We don't have any problems here. And I went, wow.
Speaker 2:You know, after the first couple months, I was like, well, hurting is in every community. It doesn't matter. Doesn't matter demographics. It doesn't matter. It's across the board.
Speaker 2:And also for the schools so that they know we use the at risk indicators by the state, but then we also have in house at risk indicators, which are things like suicide ideation, depression, cutters, have had a lot of loss at home. We've had a lot of students lose loved ones, and that affects them greatly. So these are all the things that are keeping them from being successful academically, but also helping them figure out their future, what they're gonna be doing.
Speaker 1:And then just from an organizational standpoint, what have what have been some of the obstacles in regards to scaling in regard whether it's having to fundraise more or having to find new staff? Just like, what are some of the things that you have faced that whenever you first started, you it definitely wasn't on the radar.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I was asked to to grow into a new community, and this person who had got had a lot of success in business had moved to this new community, and he said, boy, they really need mentors care. His wife was a mentor for me over at Midlothian. And he said, if I wrote a check, would you come? And I said, absolutely.
Speaker 2:But that's not sustainable. I wanna be there. If we're there, we're there. I said it needs to be seed money. And he agreed.
Speaker 2:And so we had a contract with the school district, which really is really cool because after two years of ceding funds to a district by philanthropy grant, whatever, they see the value of it, that it actually pays for itself. Because students are not dropping out. They are showing up to school. That's all translates to money for the district. But then and disciplinary, you know, that also because they're not having to deal with all the issues as much as they they would if we were not there.
Speaker 2:And two years also gives them time to get the funds into their budget. Most school districts are not gonna have a mentoring budget, but they see the value. And they don't they have a whole full time person at their school for a lot less money, and they don't have to deal with it. It's all Mentors Care. They're hired by the Mentors Care program.
Speaker 2:We handle everything, hiring and all the things. We just ask for a space and a yes, and then the contract, you know, that they'll do that. But as far as scalability, gosh, we're still dealing with that. Like, how so we are so program heavy, not so much admin. So everybody works really hard.
Speaker 2:So we're always fundraising. We have fundraisers. We're about to have a purse bingo, which is a lot of fun and does well, golf tournament. But then we're always writing grants, trying to supplement the extra that it costs for us to be there. And I'll just tell you, it was really interesting.
Speaker 2:My first three years at Midlothian, I guess it was Midlothian, a few companies were given money here and there for supplies and, you know, Dina, pay yourself a little something, that kinda thing. And I was down to my last $600. And I just I was, like, frustrated. I was like, Lord, why is it Todd and I have to sacrifice when it's helping the whole community? Why is it just because, you know, there's a lot of sacrifice that goes into that when you're starting a nonprofit, you know, out of your own.
Speaker 2:Because I could've been getting a job with all the insurances and retirement and all the thing, but, you know, Todd was awesome and supported me in that, and he felt the calling as well. So it was like, we're sacrificing I was feeling sorry for myself. And so I prayed about it and I'll be darned if it wouldn't I mean, within a couple, three months, there was $30,000 in the bank account. And some companies had gotten together and they said, figure it out. Figure out how to become sustainable.
Speaker 2:This is a one time gift, but don't quit. And that's what I needed. It was like, okay. Don't quit. And ever since then, we grow, and I'm telling you a lot of it it's on faith.
Speaker 2:It's on faith. You know? Okay, Lord. Let's do it. You know?
Speaker 2:And trying to take care of your people. We have such a culture at Mentors Care of complete support and love of one another. It is beautiful. It is beautiful how everybody takes care of one another. Our bible study our support staffs are like a bible study.
Speaker 2:We do life together. And one of the things and I I gotta get this out there because I feel like any leader needs to hear this. Because when I was a youth pastor, Lord knows I love my church, but they used me up. They didn't take care of me. I was spending so many hours.
Speaker 2:And when I finally went to the church and I said, look, I really need some help. I got a person that we can hire part time. And I was the lowest paid in the state of Arkansas at the time, youth pastor. And they came back, they said, no. Sorry.
Speaker 2:We can't do that. They made other decisions for money to go other places when it was such an amazing youth ministry. I was so devastated. And so Todd and I decided we were gonna take part of my salary and pay this person to come help me. And when I quit, I was so completely burnt out that it took me, I wanna say, think I slept a straight twenty four hours when I finally quit.
Speaker 2:I was just so exhausted. I was a young mother, and I was a youth pastor trying to do this thing that was so successful, and I was like, this is not good. Not blaming any one person at the church. It's a great church. It was just, I think, you know, fundamentally, I learned, and I think God let me go through that for this reason.
Speaker 2:To say to the people that work for Mentor's Care, you take care of your first calling first, which is your love of God and your he gave you a family. That is your first calling. Then let's go do Mentor's Care. But don't do it the other way around. If you're sacrificing for everybody else and your home life is suffering, we've done it wrong.
Speaker 2:And so I preach that all the time. And so we have a culture. And I think that's so important to have a culture of people really coming alongside, believing in the mission that you have. Because people are working for a calling, not for money. It's a calling.
Speaker 2:It is you get up every day, you're challenged, you love it. It's hard, it's good, it's bad. It's it's all the things, but you know you're not alone, and you know you're not suffering alone.
Speaker 1:Good word, Dina. And it it is it is so important to take care of your heart, to take care of the main things, keep the main things the main things. Because if we go down as mentors, then our kids won't have anyone. So it's great.
Speaker 2:And it's a good model for the kids to see that too.
Speaker 1:Right. For sure. Well, as we close-up, is there anything else that you would like to say? And I know that you have a book coming out here soon. Yeah.
Speaker 1:But yeah.
Speaker 2:So thank you for that. I went out and turned 60 and said, I gotta write this book. I've been told I need to write this book. It's scary. Rejection is a big part of my childhood, so I'm gonna be rejected.
Speaker 2:I just know it. But, you know, it's hard writing and telling your story, but I think it's so important. We're not supposed to keep that story a secret. I think we're supposed to share what what Jesus has done and how through his redeeming out of it, something amazing has happened. Not only have I become a wife and mother to an incredible family and grandmother, now this mentor's care was birthed and is impacting lives.
Speaker 2:And that is only through the faithfulness of of God and using the least of us, which is me. So that's my story. And so if they wanna go to denapetty.com, that's more of my own personal page to help launch the book and for speaking, and I'll be writing some more. And I feel like that's my calling now is hopefully inspire people to see the lost ones right around you, notice them, love them, Mentoring wherever you are. It might be somebody in your own family that needs mentoring.
Speaker 2:Just recognize it. And one last story. I do remember that when I was homeless and I looked a little dis disheveled, and you would think people would look at me with soft eyes and feel sorry for me and wanna know what's going on. It was actually opposite. I saw eyes of judgment that looked at me, What did you do to deserve your situation?
Speaker 2:Let's not do that. Let's love people. Get to know them.
Speaker 1:That's right, Dina. It reminds me of the verse, he who calls you is faithful, he will surely do it. And so often as mentors, we just get to show up and just take part in what he's up to. So Do you So we're thankful for you and for all of the hard work and for what you guys were doing over there at Mentors Care and excited to check out the book and excited to have you come to our conference here in April. And Yeah.
Speaker 1:Man, I just know that there are so many people who can learn and
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 1:Take what you have created and help it mentor mentor more kids in in the name of Jesus. So super thankful for you, Dina.
Speaker 2:Thank you for what you do, Zac.
Speaker 1:Yes, ma'am. Of course. Thank you all so much for tuning in to the podcast. Share it with your mentoring friends. Go check out Mentors Care, and remember, you can mentor.
Speaker 1:Thanks for tuning in to the You Can Mentor podcast. Our vision is to raise up and invest in mentoring leaders who will launch and grow thriving mentoring ministries. We do that by equipping and encouraging faith based leaders through relational connection, Christ centered resources, and collaborative gatherings. Check out our books, come to the National Christian Mentoring Gathering, and engage with our network and cohorts. You can find all this at ukmentor.com or on social media.
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