University of Cincinnati Foundation - Med Mentors
51 Goodman Drive, Suite 100, P.O. Box 19970
Cincinnati, OH 45219
U.C. Med Mentors
UC Med Mentors was founded in 2001 by Dr. Wan Lim, Professor Emeritus. Med Mentors is a youth mentoring opportunity for UC medical students to reach out to the youth of Cincinnati. The purpose of the UC Med Mentors program is as follows:I. To be involved in the academic and intellectual growth of the mentees - UC Med Mentors provide weekly guidance, encouragement and support to ensure their mentees excel academically.II. To enrich the lives of the mentees. - In addition to helping youth succeed academically, UC Med Mentors are encouraged to enrich the lives of their mentees through shared experiences that build character and positivity.III - To expose medical students to cultural differences.
UC Med Mentors is an affinity group under the Cincinnati Youth Collaborative (CYC), which provides mandatory training for medical students to become effective physician leaders. The mission of UC Med Mentors is multifold: To be involved in the academic and intellectual growth of the mentees; to enrich the lives of the mentees; and to encourage the mentees to be computer literate.
UC Med Mentors provides disadvantaged children one-on-one mentoring lunches/cultural events such as tickets to FC Cincinnati games, Reds games, UC Men’s Basketball games, UC Women’s Basketball games, the Aronoff Center and Playhouse in the Park. While the youth benefit from mentors, cultural events, and becoming computer literate, the program also builds University of Cincinnati medical students into strong and compassionate physician leaders.
The outcomes for all involved are incredibly meaningful. About 75 children from Cincinnati Public Schools participate per year and have shown improvement in grades, school attendance and behavior. The UC medical students grow in cultural competency and in understanding of the challenges of children in impoverished families.
CYC does not provide funding for activities. For this reason, UC Med Mentors relies on charitable support.
Program Goals:
The goals of UC Med Mentors are to 1) improve the academic skills of mentees, 2) enrich the lives of mentees, and 3) expose medical students to cultural differences.
Over time, the program has grown from 17 mentors to 150-200 mentors annually, representing about 25% of all UC medical students. About 75 children currently participate. The children in the program show improvement in grades, school attendance and behavior.
Program impact is measured by continued tracking of the children’s academic progress (which includes monitoring grades, tracking mentees' school attendance and conducting surveys/interviews of mentees' parents and teachers). The Cincinnati Youth Collaborative (CYC) regularly collects this data over the mentor-mentee relationship to demonstrate the success of the program. In addition, the mentors take a pre- and post-mentoring cultural competency survey to measure the impact of the program on the medical students.
UC Med Mentors is affiliated with the CYC, which provides mandatory training and is responsible for identifying and matching the mentees with the mentors. However, CYC does not provide funds to support any activities of UC Med Mentors, and the program relies on the generosity of UC Med Mentor alumni and private foundations. For this reason, to help the UC Med Mentors Program this year and for future planning, we kindly ask the Charles H. Dater Foundation for a pledge of $75,000 over three years.
Program Results:
No grant evaluation report was submitted.
Website:
http://www.med.uc.edu/education/medical-student-education/office-of-medical-education/service-learning/serv Amount: $25,000
Date: March 2023
