Fort Bend County juvenile mentor program aims to deter crime

To become a mentor with the Fort Bend Juvenile Probation Department, a volunteer must be at least age 21 and pass a background check.

“If that comes back positive and ready to go, then we ask that mentor to give at least an hour a week, matched with one [child] that is currently on probation,” Bearden said.

The department models its mentoring program on Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, in which a mentor picks up the child from his or her home and does something active with him or her one on one, she said.

“Whether that be bowling or movies or whatever you would do with your own child, just exposing them to things [like] that. Obviously, they haven’t had a positive adult role model in their life,” Bearden said. “So we’re trying to provide that person for them from the community.”

Community members have been mentoring youths in the detention center in Richmond for more than a decade, Bearden said. There is still a need for volunteering in the detention center, she said, because those visits might be the child’s only visits.

However, the probation department would prefer to grow the expanded mentoring program, she said. Bearden is trying to get the word out to any potential volunteers throughout the Fort Bend County area.

“You really do touch the kids more when you get to actually [do activities] with them,” Bearden said. “Going to see them in the detention center is more like a crisis situation. They don’t even know what’s going to go on with them. It’s like jail visitation.”

Each mentorship is coordinated individually, and volunteers are needed year-round, Bearden said.

To volunteer as a mentor call 281-633-7317 or visit https://fbpfy.org.