By Dr. Véronique Church-Duplessis, and Jessica Sims
The inaugural Canadian Mentoring Summit in Calgary, Alberta, this November, is more than just a conference; it is a milestone event for the Canadian mentoring field. Uniting a diverse network of mentoring leaders, practitioners, researchers, and policymakers, the Summit provides an unparalleled opportunity to address a critical national challenge: Canada’s mentoring gap.
Mentor Canada’s foundational “Mapping the Mentoring Gap” study, based on a survey of 2,838 young adults aged 18 to 30, revealed that 44% of young adults in Canada grew up without the support of any mentor. More importantly, 54%of all survey respondents recalled a time when they wished they had access to one but did not. This includes 62% of youth who already had at least one mentor.
This data strongly suggests that the mentoring gap is not just about a lack of a single mentor; it is about the need for multiple, evolving, supportive relationships throughout childhood and adolescence and into adulthood. The Summit serves as the nexus for developing evidence-based strategies and cross-sectoral partnerships needed to bridge this gap.
The transformative effect on youth outcomes
A core message from the research is the profound, lasting influence that mentoring has on young people’s lives. The study confirmed a clear statistical association between access to mentoring and a wide range of positive outcomes in early adulthood.
Mentored young adults were significantly more likely to report positive outcomes compared to their non-mentored peers:
- Mental Health and Well-being: They were 53% more likely to report good or excellent mental health.
- Educational Attainment: They were over twice as likely to have completed high school. They were also 95%more likely to have pursued further education after high school.
- Social Capital and Community: They were over two times more likely to report a very or somewhat strong sense of belonging to their local community.
Beyond these outcomes, mentored youth showed continued commitment to the movement, being more than twice as likely to have already served and be interested in serving as a mentor themselves compared to non-mentored youth.
Confronting systemic barriers and advocating for equity
The Summit is designed to address the deeply entrenched systemic barriers that fuel the mentoring gap, particularly for equity-deserving populations. The research illuminated where the greatest needs and disparities lie:
- Higher Need, High Demand: Youth who faced at least one risk factor growing up were twice as likely to report unmet needs for a mentor than youth who did not experience risk factors. Similarly, youth with a disability were almost three times more likely to report unmet needs compared to youth without a disability.
- Reaching Vulnerable Youth: Formal programs demonstrate success in reaching these groups, with youth facing risk factors being twice as likely to have a formal mentor compared to youth who did not. Indigenous youth were also twice as likely to have access to a formal mentor compared to non-Indigenous youth. This data confirms that targeted interventions are reaching those who can benefit the most, but the demand greatly outstrips the supply, leading to high unmet needs.
- Barriers to Access: The single most common barrier to accessing a mentor was not knowing how to find one. Closely following was not understanding what mentoring was or its value. This highlights a national need for clarity and visibility in the mentoring field.
The Summit’s dedication to inclusive mentorship is vital in this context and will launch new Canadian research on racialized young adults and mentoring, bringing forward solutions that—focus on youth-initiated mentoring, social capital, and culturally relevant practices—which are essential when addressing the lived experiences of racism and intergenerational trauma.
Building national capacity: The cross-sectoral imperative
To close the gap where over half of young people wish they had more mentorship, the focus shifts to national capacity building through cross-sectoral collaboration.
The study validates the central role of both informal connections and intentional programming:
- Informal is key: The most meaningful mentor reported was often an informal or natural mentor (80% of the time), most frequently a teacher, other school staff, or family friend.
- Formal mentoring as the connector: While informal mentors are prevalent, formal programs are positioned to strengthen a young person’s overall network. Youth reported that formal mentors were more likely than mentors overall to help them connect to other services and/or supports (55%), connect to their culture (49%), and attend community events or offerings (47%). Formal mentors act as vital connectors, strengthening the mentee’s overall ecosystem of supportive relationships and social capital.
The Canadian Mentoring Summit, featuring leading mentoring researchers from across Canada and North America, and partners like the Social Research and Demonstration Corporation, the Canadian Centre for Mentoring Research and the Students Commission Canada, is leveraging these insights to integrate mentoring more effectively into the youth employment ecosystem, ensuring that young Canadians have the supports they need to engage and succeed in the workforce.
By bringing together the best in research and practice, the field is positioning itself to deliver intentional, quality, and multiple supports—the kind of relationships youth actually need and want—to all young Canadians.
To learn more about the Canadian Mentoring Summit and to register, click here.
Mentor Canada is the only national registered charity dedicated to supporting and building capacity for mentoring across the country, linking programs and initiatives to a comprehensive portfolio of leading-edge mentoring resources, research, training, and networking opportunities.
Véronique Church-Duplessis, Senior Director, Research and Impact. Véronique conducts vital research that illuminates realities, obstacles, and opportunities for mentoring in Canada. Her work enables practitioners to make informed decisions and Mentor Canada to deliver much-needed solutions that link research to practice. Committed to making research actionable, she helped create the Canadian Centre for Mentoring Research to facilitate exchanges between academics and practitioners. Véronique’s past studies and professional experiences centred on the development of modern gender norms, gender-based violence prevention, and healthy relationships for teens. veronique.church-duplessis@mentorcanada.ca
Jessica Sims, Marketing & Communications Strategist, Digital Content. A compelling storyteller in both official languages, Jessica is passionate about highlighting the human side of mentoring, engaging diverse audiences in recognizing why Canada needs a stronger mentoring field where no one is ever denied access to a mentor. A true digital native, Jessica loves weaving words and visuals into high-impact, relatable web and social media content. Daily, she channels her creativity, marketing experience and consummate organizational skills to propel Mentor Canada’s mission forward. jessica.sims@mentorcanada.ca
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