The Kindness of Strangers: Adult Mentors, Urban Youth, and the New Voluntarism

Many of us care deeply about the fate of young people growing up in poverty. We worry about their future and the future of an increasingly fragmented society. We want to help, but often don’t know how, or even where to begin. The Kindness of Strangers reveals how caring adults in cities across America are trying to turn young lives around. It also tells of the much-celebrated mentoring movement they have created. Based on interviews with over 300 mentors, young people, scholars, and youth workers, this book takes a hard look at mentoring and asks some critical questions: how much can mentoring really accomplish? what does it take to be a successful mentor? what makes the difference between an effective program and one fraught with difficulties? Marc Freedman brings experience, research, and realism to these questions in an effort to present the truth about the mentoring movement sweeping America today.

• Based on original research, but engagingly written • Mentoring is a currently a big issue

1. A call to action; 2. Great expectations; 3. Recurring fervor; 4. Birth of a movement; 5. The benefits of mentoring; 6. The limits of mentoring; 7. Making the most of mentoring; 8. Closing the caring gap; 9. Re-engaging the middle class; 10. Reinventing community.

‘Freedman’s book is filled with useful insights … [it is] balanced, well-written and - wonder of wonders, for a book on social policy - an enjoyable read as well.’ Youth Today

‘Marc Freedman … has written a comprehensive and informative book on mentoring that practitioners and policymakers will find useful … Freedman accomplishes these objectives in an engaging, lively, and concise style.’ Social Work and Education