He's not heavy - he's my brother

By CATHERINE MASTERS

Fifteen-year-old Tony Swensson was so furious he wanted to "smash the dude."

The "dude" was another Kelston Boys High School student - but six months later the now genial Tony cannot even remember why he was so angry that he wanted to hurt another boy.

He says his anger was not really directed at the student anyway.

It was "because of heaps of stuff that's happened to me in the past, but I wouldn't go into that as it's a bit personal."

And he did not "smash the dude" as he once would have. Instead, he sought out his mentor, Daniel Queenin, and talked the anger through.

At 16, Daniel is Tony's solid, specially trained friend who is always there for him no matter what.

"If I feel I'm about to lose control, I go find Daniel and I sit down and talk about it and figure out a way of helping without getting into trouble. He's like a brother to me."

Says Daniel: "I'm just there to really listen. If he's got something to say, I'll listen. If he's got any problems, I'll try and help him resolve them without getting into trouble."

The mentoring system at the school, which involves trained older students like Daniel taking younger students under their wing, has been a boon for Tony, and he happily announces that it is making him a better person.

A year ago, it was a different story. He picked fights. He swore and blamed and raged and he reckons he was on the verge of expulsion.

The worst kid in school, as he was described by the teachers, was dealing with major problems - his father had split from the family and no longer took any notice of him.

Principal John Clarke says the mentoring programme has worked wonders for students like Tony, who now "walks so tall."

A variety of similar programmes are springing up all over the country. One woman who cannot praise them enough is a former principal who has seen scores of similar young men "filled with anger."

Ann Dunphy, once head of the low-decile Penrose High School and now a lecturer at the Auckland College of Education, is working hard to set up a mentoring association, so that the public can easily access all the programmes.

Some programmes buddy adults with children, such as one at Penrose High which involves the local Rotary club; others, such as the one at Kelston Boys, buddy younger students with older students.

When people ask what they can do to stop child abuse - as Lucy Lawless, Xena: Warrior Princess, recently did - Ann Dunphy says one of the best things is to volunteer to be a mentor.

"As a mentor, you're there to be an unconditional friend for the kid. Basically, you're another adult. You're not a family member, you're not a teacher, you're someone who's there for them. You're offering your knowledge, experience. It's all about avoiding this loss and waste of human potential."

She believes that many angry young men never have what she calls an effective intervention, such as a mentor, and go off the rails or repeat abuse they may have suffered.

"What happens is that they just take it for all these years and finally, by the time they get to high school, or sometimes it's the last year in intermediate, they're not going to take it any more and they are timebombs ready to explode."

She cites - as an extreme example - Travis Burns, who was abandoned by his father as a child and was recently convicted of murdering Whangaparaoa woman Joanne McCarthy.

Ann Dunphy believes mentoring is one of the best ways to turn back a tide of young people heading down a possible path of despair.

The manager of an Otago mentoring scheme says showing children and adolescents that there are different ways of dealing with situations can help break the cycle.

Jill McDonald, who runs the Presbyterian Support Otago Buddy Programme, tells the story of a young child, known as a little buddy, who was baking with her big buddy. The little girl dropped a cup of flour on the floor and it broke, the flour spilling everywhere. "The little buddy cowered, expecting to be hit for making a mess. She was really surprised to see the big buddy laugh it off and say, 'Never mind, it doesn't matter'."

Another child on the programme was out with his mentor and his mentor's 12-year-old son. The little buddy expected his buddy to give her own son a hiding for being naughty, as he would probably have received at home. Like the little girl, the boy was amazed that there would be no hiding and learned there could be other consequences for bad behaviour, such as not being allowed to watch his favourite TV programme.

"For these two children, they have learned another way of responding to a situation, and although they are only two small examples, they open the way for a different world view," says Ms McDonald.

If a child is being abused, having a safe person to spend time with is very important, she says.

"One of my colleagues has worked a lot with people who were abused as children, and they've all been able to name someone who was a safe person for them, whether it be a safe place or a safe person, somewhere they could go, and I think that's someone that a buddy can be. They may never talk about it with them, but just knowing there is somewhere they can go and that it's safe makes a difference.

"I hope that later on when they're bringing up their own children, they think, 'No, that's right, my buddy did it a different way.' Because if they don't know that, they haven't really got a choice."