Become a Mentor
Want to be a pioneer on the cutting edge of a quiet revolution in education?
Become A BrainBuilder Mentor
Most educators enter the profession with a genuine passion to connect with students and help shape them in powerful ways for lives of impact. But after faculty meetings, extracurricular duties, coaching, lesson plans, and paper grading, personal instructive interaction with students--where you witness the quintessential light-bulb moment--is rare.
In contrast, job satisfaction for a BrainBuilder Mentor is high. Eighty to ninety percent of a BrainBuilder Mentor’s time is spent interacting one-on-one with students, conversing, instructing, assessing, creating, and laughing. Over the course of a student’s BrainBuilders tenure, a mentor will actually see students’ writing and speaking improve, as well as their attitude toward learning. Grades may also improve, but, in the end, an inquisitive, well-exercised, and broadly knowledgable mind is the highest objective.
BrainBuilders Mentors see beyond the student’s next test. They build satisfying, long-lasting mentoring relationships with young people who blossom under one-on-one attention and encouragement. Mentors avoid the aggravation, hassle, and frustration of working in an educational bureaucracy, while creating a flexible work schedule. And they earn close to full-time pay for 25 hours a week or less.
The Program:
- BrainBuilders Mentors meet one-on-one with a maximum of 12 high school students once a week during the school year.
- The BrainBuilders program lasts all four years of a student’s high school career, so it’s crucial that the Mentor commits to one location.
- BrainBuilders does not replace a student’s conventional classroom education. It supplements and augments it, helping to “put it all together.”
- BrainBuilders includes an optional summer writing program called Write Right.
- The overall objective of the BrainBuilders program is to nurture intellectual maturity though the exercise of 12 mental “muscles”:
- Reading comprehension
- Vocabulary
- Composition
- Critical Thinking
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- Memory
- Character building
- Rhetoric
- Cultural Literacy
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- Curiosity
- Right Brain work
- Creativity
- Wonder
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The transformative dimension of the program rests on the mentoring relationship established with the student. BrainBuilders go "long and deep with a few." We lavish attention, interest, love, fun, and joy on the individual student’s heart as well as his mind. But we set high intellectual and academic standards as well, working persistently on the most difficult aspects of his academic life--critical thinking, reading comprehension, succinct writing, and eloquent speaking. We consistently practice these critical aspects of a student’s educational development throughout the BB relationship. Guided exercise and practice over time promotes genuine understanding and mastery that is difficult to achieve in the industrial educational model.
The bottom line: a life-long love of learning.
Win/Win for Students: a weekly opportunity to have an authentic conversation about a wide variety of subjects and issues; no performance pressure of a grade or watching audience of peers; personal, patient help with difficult reading and writing assignments that focuses on skill development and mastery, not just “getting a better grade”; freedom from the prison of pedantic planned curriculum; freedom to explore every subject of natural curiosity; serendipitous and authentic moments of fun in learning.
Win/Win for Parents: Their teens receive professional level instruction, coaching, and practice that enhances a student’s high school learning experience. Parents also receive a weekly email detailing the session’s activities, which serves as a record of the student’s progression through the program.
Win/Win for Mentors: A deeply satisfying career of influence and impact without the frustrations, difficulties and low pay of a school teacher; flexible hours; a nearly full-time salary for part-time work that allows a Mentor to expand the business, build a family, or write a novel; thorough, in-depth mentor training in both the curriculum and the business aspect of the program; as well as all the business support and resources of website, marketing, scheduling, curriculum, accounting, and professional development.
BrainBuilders Mentors must be:
- Very relational and conversational
- Passionate readers – especially the humanities
- Interested in a wide variety of topics
- Renaissance people
- Skilled writers
- Articulate
- Good with young people
- Broad-minded
- Teachable
- Self-disciplined
- Confident
- Positive
- Adventurous
- Resourceful
- Flexible
- Seeking and growing spiritually
- High moral character: honesty, integrity, respect, humility, selflessness, kindness, patience
- OR willing to develop these qualities.
Mentor Requirements
- College undergraduate degree from accredited university – preferably a liberal arts degree.
- Commitment to BB-conducive suburban community for at least 4-6 years.
- Well-developed connections within the community to build client base (or willingness to do so)
- Stable personal life and orderly home environment
Location:
Ideally, a BrainBuilders Mentorship is located within a 3-5-mile radius of 3-4 college-prep suburban high schools or private upper schools in American cities larger than 500,000. Student sessions occur in the home of a BrainBuilders Mentor.
Mentor Training:
Accepted candidates receive 6-12 months of training, which can take place long-distance through the use of Skype and email. Training typically requires 8-20 hours a week of reading, writing, observing sessions and meeting with a Mentor Trainer. The training program can be customized to the individual trainee’s background and educational experience, so the time expenditure will vary accordingly. Trainees do not earn a salary during training, so they must either find part-time employment, or rely on a spouse for support during the training period.
Business Relationship:
Once BB Mentors complete their training and enroll their students, they become employees of BrainBuilders Gymnasium, which provides professional development, legal, and business system support for Mentors in all locations.
Things to know about Sue Stewart, founder of BrainBuilders Gymnasium:
- I love the Lord my God with all my heart, all my soul and all my MIND.
- Next to the Lord, my husband and six children are my greatest joy.
- I am blessed to nurture the intellectual and spiritual growth of young people.
- I have a Master’s Degree in English from Baylor University.
- I have 23 years teaching experience:
- College English (10 years) -- including research writing, British and American Lit;
- Private middle school (3 years) -- English & Social Studies;
- Homeschool (5 years) – all subjects;
- BrainBuilders (7 years).
- I’ve had articles and critical reviews printed in a variety of publications, including The Faith and Cultural Devotional by Lael Arrington, 2008.
- I have been honed and refined by a number of life calamities – and can attest to the humbling and instructive nature of adversity.
Find out about the BrainBuilder experience:
I can supply additional parent and student references if necessary.
To apply for a position as a BrainBuilder Mentor:
The application process is fairly rigorous, but you can start by emailing your resume and a 2-page essay entitled “My Defining Moments” to the email address below. Choose three formative life experiences and share how they shaped your character. You can re-title the essay for brownie points!
