MEET THE TEAM
OUR STAFF
Chris Douglas
Director
Julian Laham
Mentoring Coordinator
Leon Ambrosino
Youth Worker
Simon Albury
Administrative Coordinator
Our Board
Our volunteer Board members generously devote their time, significant skills and leadership experience to their tasks of governance, financial stewardship and strategic direction.
Peter Evans - Amy Baker - Chris Douglas - David Ratten - Moreen Pakwan - Stephen Smith
Greg Warmbrunn (Absent)
OUR STORY
IGNITE
Ignite began in 2009 as a grassroots response to the needs of migrant youth in partnership with a suburban high school in Melbourne’s south east. Jeff Andrews and Jay Sawyer created timely opportunities for young people to access community-based sport and positive mentoring relationships. Running after school sports programs, leadership development and sports camps, they leveraged the commitment of a large and diverse volunteer leader base, resulting in hundreds of wonderful stories of positive impact.
GLENNY MENTORING
Almost at the same time, Mark Philpott and Chris Douglas began experimenting with a group mentoring program at a local high school in Melbourne’s south east in an attempt to bridge the gap between what young men needed, and what schools, with limited resources, could provide. Glenny mentoring, officially launched in 2010, quickly gained traction and by 2018, over 200 students had participated in boys and girls mentoring programs, supported by a group of generous volunteer mentors including a large number of former students keen to re-invest their time in the next generation. Glenny mentoring utilised the power of peer support, mentoring camps and sport to pioneer a number of school-based and community-based group mentoring programs.
COLLABORATION
In response to the changing needs of Victorian youth and a desire to share the lessons learned from their youth work practice with the wider community, Jeff commenced research in 2016 into adolescent development, with a particular interest in recovering rites of passage principles for contemporary youth work practice. This included testing creative ideas to address the hypothesis that strong intergenerational relationships together with positive meaning-making experiences have enormous transformative potential for Australian teenagers as they navigate adolescence.
RITE MENTORING INC
Following a successful collaboration, Ignite and Glenny Mentoring formalised their shared vision in 2019, resulting in Rite Mentoring Inc commencing operations with a capable and independent Board. The new organisation gained charity status, incorporating as a public benevolent institution to reflect our particular concern for our most vulnerable youth and our commitment to promoting equal access to mentoring support across the community.
