Sebelius announces support for local mentoring efforts
More than $600,000 to go to 15 Kansas mentoring programs

The Kansas Mentors initiative, led by Coach Bill Snyder, is designed to provide mentoring opportunities for children throughout Kansas.

To strengthen local mentoring efforts, Governor Kathleen Sebelius has dedicated more than $600,000 in federal funds to 15 local mentoring programs.

“When I created Kansas Mentors with Coach Snyder last January, I made a commitment to support mentoring in Kansas.  These grant funds will help local efforts expand their outreach and match more children with caring adult mentors,” Sebelius said.

 The funds come from the Governor’s discretionary portion of the Federal Safe and Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act grant program, which is administered by the U.S. Department of Education.  The grant program is designed to support efforts that prevent violence and illegal use of alcohol, tobacco and drugs among children and youth. 

Coach Snyder, who leads Kansas Mentors, is appreciative of the Governor’s support of mentoring in the state.  He also announced that Kansas Mentors has issued a grant to YouthFriends of Kansas City to host the state’s first statewide mentoring conference in early 2007.

“We are looking forward to bringing together leaders from across the state to discuss ways to promote existing mentoring efforts, to determine how many additional mentors are needed in Kansas, and to discuss methods for expanding programs into unserved or underserved areas,” Snyder said. 

YouthFriends of Kansas City will provide a dollar-for-dollar match to the state’s grant of $16,282 to facilitate the conference.

For more information about Kansas Mentors please visit www.ksmentors.ks.gov

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