Telling and Sharing Stories of Survival and Success: Intergenerational and Transformational Mentoring for Young Mothers

• In Event: 66.042 - "We're Not Just Changing Diapers, We're Changing the World!" Young Parents Transforming Their Communities

Abstract

Objectives
The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of intergenerational mentorship in the lives of young mothers, and how transformational mentorship can be used to enhance skills, build relationships, and promote success among generations of Latina mothers. This qualitative study aims to examine perspectives of mentors and mentees participating in an intergenerational mentorship program for parents attending an alternative high school in Chicago.
Perspectives/background
Research that has informed this project explores “mujer (woman) centered articulations of teaching and learning,” epistemologies that recognize everyday contexts, such as families, networks, and communities, as settings for the development of important skills and knowledge (Bernal, Elenes, Godinez, & Villenas, 2006, p. 3). Among Latinas, the telling and sharing of stories of survival and resistance is part of a pedagogy of convivencia, or communalism, and provides communal spaces for teaching and learning (Villenas, 2005, p. 274). The mentorship project examined in this study utilizes a “transformational mentorship” model, rooted in notions of “resilient resistance,” in which young Latina mothers struggle and prevail as way of challenging stereotypes and countering the stigma that many young parents face (Solorzano & Bernal, 2001; Yosso, 2000).

Methods
This project used qualitative methods to examine the role of an intergenerational mentorship program for participating mentors and mentees. The mentorship program, entitled Proyecto Atabey, is an initiative of the Family Learning Center (FLC), a school-based program for young parents, aged 16-21, attending an alternative high school located in the Humboldt Park community of Chicago, an area that has long been associated with the city’s Puerto Rican community. Mentors range in age from 23-45, and had themselves been young parents.

Data for this study was collected via in-depth individual interviews with 5 mentors and 5 mentees, which focused on their experiences in the program. Other data included observations of program sessions over the course of 2 years, review of program documents and materials, and analysis of social media posts related to the program. Data has been analyzed inductively, using open coding techniques (Bogdan & Biklen, 2006). Analytical memoing (Emerson, Fretz, & Shaw, 2011) was employed to help researchers develop assertions about the role of mentorship in the lives of participants.
Results
Mentors provided presentations to groups of parents enrolled within the school and also worked individually with one young mother. In presentation and mentorship sessions, they shared some of their own experiences as young parents and described some of the challenges they faced, as well as how they incurred discrimination as a teen parent. These testimonios—about pregnancy and birth, relationships, struggles, and, ultimately, survival—promoted intergenerational relationships and helped strengthen their identities as young Latina mothers, develop expanded notions of themselves and their possibilities to be successful.

Scholarly significance
There is limited research available on the role of authentic mentorship in the lives and trajectories of young mothers. This study hopes to inform models in the area of mentorship for adolescent mothers and contribute to knowledge regarding ways to promote young Latina mothers’ educational, professional, and personal success.

Authors

• Danette Sokacich, Pedro Dr. Albizu Campos High School

• Cynthia Brito, University of Illinois-Chicago

• Roxane Padilla, Proyecto Atabey

• Elizabeth Ruth Alaniz, Proyecto Atabey