AMACHI (PA)

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Program Description

The Amachi program began in Philadelphia in January 2000. A West African word, Amachi means "who knows but what God has brought us through this child." Recognizing that an estimated 20,000 children in Philadelphia have parents who are incarcerated, the Amachi program was developed to provide support to these at-risk children by providing them with caring adult mentors. Amachi has three types of mentoring programs: community-based one-on-one mentoring, school-based one-on-one mentoring, and church-based one-on-one mentoring. The program is organized around clusters of 10 congregations, each of which is given a stipend. As part of a performance-based agreement, each participating congregation must maintain at least 10 active mentors. To maintain the full stipend, each congregation is required to submit data collection forms in a timely manner. Public/Private Ventures staff provides data collection, reporting, and management services, which allow program managers to assess the congregations' activities and monitor the mentoring matches.

The Amachi model for pairing adults and children begins in the congregations where volunteer mentors are recruited. Volunteers are screened by Big Brothers Big Sisters of America (BBBSA) in order to ensure that they are suitable to participate in the program. BBBSA also provides training in appropriate and effective mentoring techniques, with a focus on developmental approaches that allow children to establish trust in their mentors. Children are recruited by Amachi and by the congregations through prison-based outreach, community-based outreach, and the individual congregations. BBBSA case management and church coordinators supervise the matching of mentors and children.

Primary Goals
The primary goals of Amachi are to provide a supportive network to at-risk children whose parents have been incarcerated.

Networking, Partnering, and Collaboration
Amachi is a partnership between secular and faith-based institutions, including 71 congregations (50 in Philadelphia, 10 in Chester, and 11 in New York ), Public/Private Ventures (a social policy think tank), Big Brothers Big Sisters of Southwestern Pennsylvania, and the Center for Research on Religion and Urban Civil Society at the University of Pennsylvania. Due to increased exposure of Amachi, the program is expanding to other cities and states.

Outcomes
Since the inception of the Amachi program, over 600 matches have been made, with 75 percent remaining active as of April 2003. Many of the matches have been active for more than 18 months. Activity reports from the mentors indicate that, on average, they spend more than nine hours per month with the children and have over four hours of telephone contact per month. More rigorous evaluations measuring the value and the impact of the Amachi program will be conducted within the year.

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