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Every week Tamara spends an hour at school one-on-one with her RISE mentor.

They work through any issues Tamara is having with her schoolwork, maths in particular has been a focus, and also talk about her goals and ambitions and how she might achieve these.

Tamara has been attending RISE mentoring sessions for almost two years now and her mum Lauren and mentor Diana say they have seen a huge improvement in her confidence.

Diana says that Tamara has “come in leaps and bounds” in her attitude to learning and that she has enjoyed helping her develop a real love of writing and start to think about where she might take this as she approaches high school.

Mum Lauren enjoys seeing her daughter’s enthusiasm about going to school on the days that Diana will be there and says she never misses a session. The extra support she knows Tamara is getting is a huge comfort to her.

The family are under a lot of stress as dad has been in custody for several years placing pressure on Lauren, a mum of four, to care for and provide for the family on her own.

She’s extremely grateful to SHINE and says that Tamara “comes home excited to tell me everything she learnt with Diana … I can see she’s getting the help she needs.”

With her mentor’s support, Tamara, who Diana calls a ‘go-getter’, feels more capable of achieving her ambitions.

She says she’s looking forward to high school now and working on her writing, especially rhyming poems, and wants to be a canine police officer one day.

Diana brought her a book about the job and is “helping her believe” she can do it.

“Helping Tamara come up with new ideas is so motivating”, Diana says, “Mentoring is the highlight of my week.”