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SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
It's 20 minutes into the first meeting and already it feels like a family breakfast.

Stories are shared over pancakes, eggs, bacon and juice. At first glance one would never guess that this group of adults and high school students only met for the first time that morning.

Feb. 14 was the official launch of a new project that brings Big Brothers Big Sisters Canada back to Yellowknife.

While Big Brothers Big Sisters used to have a chapter in Yellowknife, opening in 1975, there were challenges recruiting enough volunteers and it hasn't been active since the 1990s.

Now, instead of staffing a standalone office with volunteers, Big Brothers Big Sisters Canada is pairing up with DreamCatcher Mentoring, a purely online-based program which pairs students with one of more than 500 mentors across Canada.

Claire Smith is the Yellowknife co-ordinator of both programs and was the Katimavik project co-ordinator before it shut down.

"DreamCatcher Mentoring was started to address high dropout rates in the North. There are around 500 volunteers from across Canada who provide career mentoring to Northern students," said Smith.

The online mentoring works through a monitored e-mail system. Students are paired with mentors based on their dream jobs. It gives them an opportunity to find out more about the occupation without leaving their community, a benefit when working in isolation up North, said Smith.

The new project gives students a chance to spend an hour a week with an adult role model while continuing with the career-focused online messaging.

The mentors have to spend one hour a week with the student they're paired with. Other than that it's up to the student to decide what they want to do.

"There's no curriculum or anything," said Smith. "There's an extensive interview and a criminal record check but the meetings do take place on school grounds."

Eric Binion is one of the volunteers. He heard about the program through a friend who directed him to contact Smith.

"I've been fairly transient so I hadn't been able to commit. But now that I'm settled it's a bit easier to get involved," said Binion.

There's hope that this partnership between the two mentoring organizations opens up other opportunities across the North, said Bruce MacDonald, president and CEO of Big Brothers Big Sisters Canada.

"We have a lot of things and yet they (DreamCatcher Mentoring) have an interesting and innovative approach."

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