Overview of Program Model

Project Eye-To-Eye was founded by Jonathan Mooney and David Flink in 1997 as a grassroots public service project run by and for students with labels such as learning disabled (LD) and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The program had one simple goal: match college and high school students labeled with LD/ADHD with labeled elementary and middle school students as role models, tutors, and mentors as a means to empower children's learning and give them hope for their future. Project Eye-To-Eye is one of the few programs in the country that challenges the deficit and pathology driven service model stifling the LD/ADHD community, and is playing a revolutionary and transformative role in empowering students labeled with LD/ADHD, one of the most marginalized minority groups in our society.

To achieve this mission, Project Eye-To-Eye partners with local communities, public and private schools, universities, and local businesses to bring adults labeled with learning disabilities into the lives of students labeled with learning disabilities. Project Eye-To-Eye supports the families of Project Eye-To-Eye children through access to family networks, and educational outreach. Project Eye-To-Eye has also developed a growing national community through the use of the Internet and community outreach to facilitate a national dialogue around labeled learning disabled students, alternative learning styles, and educational reform.

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Our Outcomes

Project Eye-To-Eye's mentoring model is designed to achieve three tangible and measurable objectives in our target population of students with learning disabilities to: 1) build self-esteem, 2) improve self-advocacy behaviors, and 3) develop meta-cognitive skills. Based on research conducted by Harvard University Graduate School of Education and Columbia University Teachers College, Project Eye-To-Eye has been shown to:

• Improve school attitudes and self-esteem; 98% of students report increased self-esteem through participation in the program.
• Improve self-advocacy behaviors; 87% of students report they felt that participation in the program helped them learn how to advocate for themselves.
• Improve meta-cognitive skills; 88% of students indicate they felt that being in the program improved their ability to understand how they learn.

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Project Eye-To-Eye's Core Program Principles

Project Eye-To-Eye seeks to develop local independent mentoring programs around the nation that adhere to the Project Eye-To-Eye Program Model. These local mentoring programs are called Project Eye-To-Eye Chapters. Modeled in part on the Coalition of Essential Schools Common Principles, Project Eye-To-Eye's organizing model is to create local, autonomous mentoring programs that are united in a national coalition by Project Eye-To-Eye's basic core programming principles.

• Mentoring and Hope: Giving students with learning disabilities hope by bringing a mentor into their lives who can model success and empowering them to imagine a positive future.
• Asset Based Academic Empowerment: Mentors providing mentees with skills that facilitate academic empowerment.
• Beyond Normal Art Club: Empowering students to develop their strengths and validating the unique gifts in art that are too often ignored within traditional educational paradigms.
• Family Networking and Empowerment: Empowering families to support their child in the development of their child's strengths, and connecting these parents to one another in order to support the creation and implementation of a powerful coalition that will share information and advocate on behalf of labeled children in their community.
• Professional Development: Providing all Project Eye-To-Eye members with training on LD/ADHD issues, art pedagogy, community development, and working with children.

In this vision of grassroots change, each chapter's specific program is tailored to the individual and unique needs and resources of each specific community. Project Eye-To-Eye Chapters consist of a Chapter Partner and Chapter Coordinator.

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Chapter Models

Chapter Partner Model
Chapter Partners are institutional liaisons such as university professors, service coordinators, local teachers, or administrators who are committed to working on a volunteer basis to support and supervise the running of local programs in partnership with the Chapter Coordinators. The goal with each Chapter Partner is to find a permanent home within already existing institutions and structures for Project Eye-To-Eye and to get a long term institutional commitment to support the program. The Chapter Partner Model ensures that Project Eye-To-Eye will have a stable base as varying Chapter Coordinators move in and out of the program. No grassroots mentoring program can be considered part of Project Eye-To-Eye without the commitment of a Chapter Partner.

The Chapter Coordinator Model
The Chapter Coordinators are students who have taken a leadership role in creating and implementing the Project Eye-To-Eye programs in their community. These coordinators are responsible for running the day-to-day operation and running of their chapter. Chapter Coordinators are expected to present an annotated action plan exploring how their program will meet the fundamental core programming principles of Project Eye-To-Eye and are provided a yearly stipend for their work.

At the beginning of each academic year, the Chapter Coordinators submit an "action plan" outlining the status of the chapter, mentor recruitment strategies, and art programming, including a materials budget, to the National Program Director. While it is expected there may be a some degree of turnover of Chapter Coordinators given the demands of college studies, Project Eye-To-Eye prefers to work with individuals who can provide at least a two-year commitment to the role of Chapter Coordinator.

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