Since its inception in 2017, our Adolescent Mentoring Program has served over 300 students aged 7-17 in Lexington County. Our intensive school-based mentoring program seeks to disrupt the school to prison pipeline by matching trained university students to youth who attend Lexington County School District Two's disciplinary alternative school, New Bridge Academy. Informed by the positive youth development framework and resiliency theory, the Adolescent Mentoring Program fosters an intensive guidance-based relationship that focuses on individualized goal setting and the development of youth competence, confidence, character, caring, and connection.

Dr. Tia Stevens Andersen is an Associate Professor of Criminology and Criminal Justice and Women’s and Gender Studies Department Affiliate at USC. She is the founder of the Adolescent Mentoring Program.