Parent/Guardian
Be an active partner. Working together, parents or care givers, volunteers, and
BBBS staff members plan activities and opportunities that can have a powerful
and positive impact on your child. Here’s what you can expect to participate in
as a partner in this match.
Talk with
Match Support monthly. We will contact you monthly
to get your point of view about the match, observations and questions. This
monthly contact is required - it allows us to provide support, and offer ideas
if problems arise. Note that for safety
purposes, we will suspend or terminate any match where consistent conversation
is not occurring.
Along
with your child, participate in scheduled assessments and other requests. Big Brothers Big Sisters uses assessment date
to recommend match direction, identify resources you may need, to evaluate the
effectiveness of the program and of course, to ensure safety.
Know about each activity and give your approval in advance. When your child returns home from an activity with their Big, it's very important that you talk openly with them about the activity. We'll talk with you about your observations and conversation during our monthly conversations.
Call us! If
you need help locating resources, are moving, have a joy to share, have safety
concerns or need to talk about the match, call your Match Support Specialist.
Respect
boundaries. We educate volunteers, families
and Littles' about the importance of focusing on what this match is and what it isn’t.
For example, we ask all parents to remember that the Big is a volunteer and
should not be asked to perform any services for the family, buy clothes or
supplies, be asked to take siblings on outings, bring the child home to an
empty house, and so on. We’ll look more
at volunteer roles and responsibilities further on in this guide.
Follow
all policies, procedures and ground-rules. Without exception, it is critical to safety
and healthy relationship development that you adhere to our rules, as do our
volunteers. We will discuss these during your training.
Support
your child's mentoring relationship.
The time your child spend with his or her Big
can be an invaluable experience so sticking to scheduled times, getting to know
the Big, talking with your child about the experience and promoting the
activities and events offered by the agency are great ways to partner.