‘Mentoring significantly contributes to personal, academic and professional development’

The importance of mentoring and young people was the focus of the latest meeting of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Youth Affairs.

Fifteeen-year-old #iwill ambassador Billy Curtis, who attended the meeting with fellow ambassador Maryam Jazeem, aged 12, shares his experience…

I have been an ambassador since last year and it has been a great experience, writes Billy. Alongside my fellow ambassadors, I have worked on impactful policies and attended some of the UK’s biggest political and charitable events, including the Conservative Party conference last October. Before becoming an #iwill ambassador, I was a member of the Youth Parliament. 

An APPG is a cross-party group of MPs and Peers who work collectively to discuss, promote and campaign on a specific issue. In this case, #iwill attended the APPG on Youth Affairs, focused on the important topic of mentoring. 

I have personally been positively impacted thanks to the help of a mentor and am passionate about the promotion of this subject. It does not just help with the long list of transitional phases young people go through to prepare ourselves for adulthood, but ensures we can share our negative or positive thoughts at that moment. 

Mentoring also significantly contributes to the personal, academic, and professional development of our lives. 

On a personal level, mentors boost self-esteem and confidence through encouragement and positive reinforcement, while providing a safe space for emotional support.

Academically, mentors offer guidance and motivation, helping mentees set and achieve goals and develop critical thinking, problem-solving and time management skills. 

Professionally, mentoring exposes young people to various career paths, expands their professional networks, and hones essential workplace skills like communication and teamwork. 

Socially, mentoring improves interpersonal skills and offers positive role models, fostering healthy relationships and behaviors.

Since #iwill is a UK leader in championing youth voice, it only made sense for us to attend the parliamentary event. On the way into Portcullis House, we saw a few notable politicians, like Wes Streeting MP, and we even had MPs in our APPG, which is always good. 

MPs Jo Gideon, Lloyd Russell-Moyle and Gavin Williamson joined us and contributed their thoughts. To our ease, they all wanted to keep championing mentoring and youth voice in general.   

Representatives from Scouts, YMCA, St John Ambulance, Youth Parliament and, of course, we were there. It was extremely useful to work collaboratively across organisations to give our feedback and questions to the APPG. 

In the following weeks and months ahead, we need more young people in the conversation about the importance of mentoring; we need the opportunities of mentoring available to all; and, if anything, we need to make sure your economic status shouldn’t prevail over the mentoring opportunities on offer.

Ms Gideon, Conservative MP for Stoke-on-Trent Central, who chairs the APPG, agreed with my point about the importance of young people discussing this topic. She said: “Youth feedback is massively important because everyone wants to know they are offering the right things, in the right place at the right time. Youth voice is massively important going into the general election because you’re the future. It is as simple as that.” 

Mr Russell-Moyle,  Labour (Co-op) MP for Brighton, Kemptown, said: “For me, it is important young people have somewhere to go, something to do and someone to talk to. Mentoring is the last bit of that, particularly when you need a one-to-one interaction over a long period of time to be able to support someone become their true self.”

#iwill is a movement comprised of more than 1,000 organisations and 700 young #iwill Ambassadors & Champions from across the UK. They are united by a shared belief that all children and young people should be supported and empowered to make a positive difference on the issues that affect their livers, their communities, and broader society.

#iwill is empowering, challenging, independent, collaborative and inclusive – it belongs to everybody.

The #iwill movement is powered by young people and organisations. The #iwill Ambassadors and #iwill Champions, alongside organisations who sign up to the Power of Youth Charter, help ensure meaningful action is taken to support more children and young people to be active citizens.

The #iwill Partnership is made up of leaders of collective action groups working within and across sectors and nations of the UK to guide the #iwill movement. The independent #iwill Coordination Hub, hosted by Volunteering Matters and UK Youth supports the #iwill Partnership, #iwill Ambassadors and broader #iwill movement.

UK Youth is a leading charity with a vision that all young people are equipped to thrive and empowered to contribute at every stage of their lives. With an open network of more than 8,000 youth organisations and nation partners; UK Youth reaches more than four million young people across the UK and is focused on unlocking youth work as the catalyst of change that is needed now more than ever. To find out more, visit ukyouth.org 

UK Youth is involved in a range of programmes designed to help young people thrive, such as outdoor learning, physical literacy, social action and employability, including Hatch, a youth employability programme run in partnership with KFC. For more on UK Youth’s programmes, see ukyouth.org/what-we-do/programmes