Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Bay Area

BBBS is a great idea for a program that strives to help kids of all backgrounds navigate through life, to put it in general terms. More specifically, little’s get signed up for the program through various means. Parents do so voluntarily, or more likely legal issues happening in families, so a court judge may strong recommend the program to a little who may be victimized. The idea is to target kids who are struggling through school/​friends/​family to get through adversaries. This is done by bigs providing mentorship through informal settings by spending time together and just talking about what’s been going on in the little’s life.
When I first applied to be a big brother in this program, my application was not considered. I reapplied and it was only after about half a year and a lot of pestering follow up emails before I got matched up. I understand they need to be sure the match is a right fit, they should realize the limitations of their match success predictabilities. They have individual interviews with the big and the little+family. I was finally matched with a little, and there was a collective interview where the big, little+family, and match support specialist outlined how the program would work. There’s a lot of details that goes behind a big/​little relationship. If you have any questions about a big, feel free to send me a message. Overall it’s a solid program.
Only real downside is that a lot of activities are not funded by the program/​city. It’s hard to always find free things to do. They do have partnerships with certain other orgs that offer discounts to big/​littles, as well as raffles for ticket events to sporting events, zoos, plays, but it’s definitely a discouragement to potential bigs who are really willing to spend their time, but may not have the $ to spend. Bigs are already doing this on a voluntary basis by sacrificing time and travel expenses, so having to put $ into this is even more of a turn off.
Be careful of some of the raffles. I once won tickets to go see a play, and turns out it was not little friendly. It actually wasn’t even «me-​friendly». Literally, and im not exaggerating even a little, the entire audience and play cast were all seniors. Not even a single middle aged person. The play was a musical recreation of the old days sometime in the 1800s when workers mine for gold and get paid 25 cents a day and that was considered middle class.

I first decided to become a Big Sister in about May 2009. I filled out an application online, and waited for someone to call me. Pretty soon, within a couple days, Sarah from BBBS called, they wanted to get me started on the track of becoming a Big Sister! I was so excited!
They checked my references and interviewed me. They interview all Littles and Bigs to make sure they have a good match. And I think they do a good job; trying to make a bonding relationship for 2 strangers has got to be hard!
When I finally met my Little, she was great. I really credit my Match Support Specialist with putting us together. BBBS is always having trainings and support meetings, to help you along the way.
They also have events for Bigs and Littles to attend together, parties, bbq’s, etc.