May 7, 2008 – Last week, MENTOR's Caregiver's Choice program issued its first voucher for mentoring services to a family from Bend, Oregon.

Caregiver's Choice, a three year program is open to all qualified mentoring agencies, programs, and children from age 4 up to age 18 with incarcerated parent(s) in state or federal facilities. It was designed to connect parents of caregivers with pre-approved high-quality mentoring programs and to financially support the resulting mentoring relationships. Caregiver's Choice is a national program funded by the Department of Health and Human Services.

The first two vouchers were released to a family and will be used at Central Oregon Partnerships for Youth, a project of the Deschutes County Sheriff's Office. "Because of these vouchers, six and seven-year old brothers in Oregon will now be connected to stable adult role models through a mentoring relationship," said Daniel Schneider, HHS acting assistant secretary for children and families.

The program provides each eligible child with a voucher redeemable for a year of mentoring and a list of approved local mentoring programs. Once caregiver and child select a program, the program identifies a suitable mentor. The mentoring program then receives $1,000 per child to support the mentoring relationship, paid out over four installments and connected to key mentoring milestones.

MENTOR is actively recruiting mentoring programs and eligible children for participation in Caregiver's Choice. For mentoring programs, this is an opportunity to more easily access federal funding, expand their reach, and serve more children.

For more information and instructions on how to apply, please visit www.mentoring.org/caregiverschoice