The news comes all too often about New Orleans young persons being arrested or killed. Now at-risk youths have an alternative outlet — the Circle of Courage Mentoring Program — which is drawing in middle school students to help them avoid a lifetime of mistakes. Tulane criminologist Peter Scharf calls the program “an incredibly powerful tool.”
The mentoring program teaches students how to deal with
conflict in their lives. (Photos by Cheryl Gerber)
Scharf is assessing the effectiveness of the program, which was founded by educator and former inmate Khalil Osiris. The program evolves in part from a moral development system initiated in the 1970s by Scharf, who is a research professor in the Department of International Health and Development, part of the School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine.
The results so far are encouraging — there have been dramatic reductions in gun carrying, drug dealing on campus, truancy, suspensions and expulsions.
“The kids we are working with in three schools of the Orleans Parish Recovery School District are the hardest-core kids in the district,” Scharf says.
Specially trained mentors are key to the program. Many are former offenders who spent time in prison. “They are very picky about the mentors,” says Scharf. “They have to be out of that life for a number of years, but their experience makes them effective — they really understand.”
The program is geared to change the way students think.
Tulane criminologist Peter Scharf, left, says the Circle of
Courage Mentoring Program, founded by Khalil Osiris, right,
can make a difference for at-risk middle school students in
New Orleans.
The mentoring process is not just being a friend. “We also introduce cognitive conflict,” he says.
This happens when the students meet with their mentor regularly in highly structured sessions. Using a workbook, they discuss scenarios and conflicts the kids are likely to encounter in real life, allowing them to explore a variety of choices and outcomes, guided by the mentor.
Expansion of the Circle of Courage program to additional schools is under way, and more mentors, many of them Recovery School District teachers, are being recruited.
“The city needs this badly,” says Scharf. “This will help decrease the risks of crime in the city, especially violent crime.”
Arthur Nead
anead@tulane.edu
May 18, 2011
