Each of the teams entering the Youth Challenge is required to have an Adult Mentor to support them through their competition journey. The role of ‘Adult Mentor’ can be fulfilled by a teacher, youth group leader, parent or other suitably responsible person that the team should nominate. As an adult mentor your role is to be the responsible adult that accompanies the teams to the events and offers them some guidance and support away from the events while they develop their ideas e.g. helping them gain access to school computers, relevant research materials, and giving them some encouragement wherever needed.

If your team should get to the HotHouse stage of the competiton an adult is required to be onsite at the residential centre for the duration of the visit. Obviously we realise this is a substantial commitment therefore each team can have a number of suitably responsible adults who share the duty.
 

The amount of commitment from an Adult Mentor is dependant on how far your team goes, but in general adults should expect to give between 1-7 days throughout the year.  In previous years this has comprised of:
- 1 day attending the First Pitch stage (January)
- 1 day at the Forum stage (February)
- 3-5 days and nights at the HotHouse event (July)
In addition all adult mentors whose team get through the First Pitch will be expected to sign a mentor agreement.

The mentor agrees to offer support and guidance only.  If the Big Ideas team feel the mentor is providing more than guidance then steps will be taken to solve the problem, this could result in the team having to source a new mentor.  In extreme circumstances the team could be disqualified.

Mentor agreements must be signed in order to enable the teams to progress to the next stage of the competition.  Mentor agreements will be distributed after the First Pitch. 

If you would like further information on what’s involved in becoming an ‘Adult Mentor’ please email info@bigideasyouthchallenge.co.uk