Vision for the Future…
Northside neighbors and broader community partners join with NAZ families and partner organizations to help all kids graduate from high school college-ready.

As these pathways to involvement are built, more opportunities will show up on this site. These will include mentoring, tutoring, home construction projects, recreational activities, and more!

Current Volunteer Needs
The mentoring organizations aligned with the Northside Achievement Zone (NAZ) are stepping up to guarantee that every eligible child in NAZ can be matched to a mentor. We need YOU to help make this happen.

Mentoring is one of our key strategies to success. The research is clear…. kids from neighborhoods like the Northside have more school success when they are paired with a mentor.

Our partner mentoring organizations have the following missions based on a unique focus:

• Kinship of Greater Minneapolis: By creating positive relationships with caring adults, Kinship of Greater Minneapolis offers boys and girls ages 5 to 15 who face barriers in life additional support to succeed. The community mentoring program also provides an opportunity for individuals, couples and families to put their faith, compassion and life experiences into action on behalf of children. To mentor with Kinship, you need to be at least 18 years old and able to commit a minimum of 1-2 hours a week for a year.
• Bolder Options: Bolder Options is an innovative program focused on healthy youth development. Uniting one-on-one mentoring with goal setting, physical activity, tutoring, and leadership opportunities to build confidence, maximize potential, and encourage healthy life skills in 10–14 year old youth. To mentor with Bolder Options, you must be at least 21 years old and able to commit to a minimum of 2-4 hours a week for a year.
• Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Greater Twin Cities: For 90 years, Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Greater Twin Cities (BBBS) has been matching children ages 7–12 with adult mentors to help young people realize their full potential as they grow in self-confidence, become more likely to avoid violence and illegal activities, perform better in school and develop stronger relationships with adults and peers. The community mentoring program  provides an opportunity for individuals, couples or pairs and families to put their caring and life experiences into action on behalf of children. To mentor with Big Brothers Big Sisters, you must be at least 19 years old and able to commit to a minimum of 1-2 hours a week for a year.

In addition to these mentoring programs, NAZ is fortunate to partner with the Mentoring Partnership, Minnesota’s statewide organization that supports a network of mentoring programs to increase the prevalence of best practices in their programming to ensure youth and their mentors experience quality mentoring relationships.

Sign up to be a volunteer!
Sign up to receive more information about becoming a NAZ Mentor with one or more of these partners. We thank you for reaching out to children and youth in NAZ and supporting our overall goal of preparing all kids for college. If you have questions, feel free to contact Jillian at jkahn@the-naz.org or (612) 521-4405.

To learn more about the NAZ mentoring partners, click here to watch a KARE 11 special on the impact of mentoring.

To be further involved:

Learn  about other ways to engage for allies (people like you looking to support NAZ and the Zone), such as sponsoring a supply drive, and sign up for NAZ updates so that as more opportunities become available, you’ll be the first to know!