Junior Senior Friends

St. Paul's Leads the Way

Nine years ago the leadership of The Friends Program, Junior Senior Friends staff, and the Office of Community Outreach at St. Paul's School in Concord came together to create an onsite project that would match St. Paul's School students with youth from the Concord area.

Within the first couple of years, 4 to 10, Fifth and Sixth Form students (the equivalent of high school Juniors and Seniors) were meeting one-on-one with youth, typically under age 10, nearly every Monday evening of the school year.

Over time this program has evolved and is now recognized within the agency and community as one of the most instrumental ways to reach a population of young children in Merrimack County and offer the powerful mentoring experience to the St. Paul's students.

This school year there will be a group of 26 children meeting for two hours on Monday evenings with their St. Paul's Senior Friends. An evening at St. Paul's begins with greeting and sign out after which matches make their way to the dining hall for dinner. Following dinner the individual matches make activity choices, such as baking cookies, reading together in a dorm, computer games at the library, soccer in the "cage" (indoor gymnasium), and board games in the Schoolhouse.

Occasionally, the program also offers group activities, which are led by the assigned St. Paul's School Projects Leaders. At the close of the evening, matches return to an assigned room, sign in, and children are picked up by parents/guardians or transported home on the St. Paul's buses.

The growth of this partnership has allowed The Junior Senior Friends Program to serve more young people in the Concord area, as well as provide opportunities for more St. Paul's students to participate in this community outreach program. St. Paul's has also generously hosted our program's annual Holiday Party for the last three years.

The St. Paul's initiative has proven itself a great success and we are pleased to be able to offer this special opportunity to area youth participants and volunteers.