The industry professionals who volunteer as ACE mentors are the key to ACE’s success. Their practical experience and rapport with students stimulate the next generation of professionals to enter the industry workforce.
This chapter offers guidance and materials for recruiting and training mentors, explains the background check process and policy, and gives some best practice examples and tips from several affiliates.
Every adult who has access to the ACE student database and/or spends more than 20% (approximately two meetings) of the program year in the presence of students must have an approved background check in order to participate with the program. Background checks must be repeated every three years.
Background checks are conveniently administered in the ACE database through an API with our background check provider, Sterling Volunteers. Once mentors are invited through the database, the background check is completed by Sterling Volunteers, and the results are sent back to the mentor’s profile in the ACE database.
The following documents explain ACE’s background check policy and process (in the database):
ACE uses Sterling Volunteers to process our volunteer background checks. The following documents provide more information on the background check application experience for mentors and Sterling Volunteer’s security practices.
Give the Mentor Packet to new and prospective mentors. It briefly explains the program, sets forth expectations for mentors, and gives a mentor job description.
Recruiting and training best practices of three affiliates are outlined in a PPT presentation: Best Practices and Tips for Mentor and Team Leader Development.
This packet includes the following information:
*All the above documents are included in the packet (below) and are listed separately for your use.
For affiliates’ use, ACE has created a guide introducing prospective mentors to ACE, explaining mentors’ roles and responsibilities, describing the benefits of mentoring, and outlining the steps to become a mentor. This document is presented below in three different formats – PDF, PPT, and video. The video is narrated.
TOTAL VIDEO DURATION: APPROX. 55 min
0:00 Compliance
08:20 Mentor Training & Affiliate Mentor Liaison
17:13 Greater DC, Virtual Mentor Training
26:40 Twin Cities, MN, Virtual Mentor Training
33:20 Seattle, WA, Virtual Mentor Appreciation
48:02 Q&A
