“When you start to think about mentoring people, you’ve got a big job.”
North East ISD Superintendent of Schools Dr. Sean Maika stopped by Jackson Middle School to thank and inspire students in the Peer Assistance Leadership and Service (PALS) program.
“You are being asked to do one of the most important jobs at the school,” Maika explained.
More than a dozen students listened and discussed their role as a PAL.
They talked about the impact the COVID-19 pandemic has had on their social lives, the importance of mentorship and how to have compassion for one another.
“We talked about when people misbehave, we don’t know what they are going through,” said eighth-grade PAL Altonique Blake. “They carry around an invisible backpack, and we have to find out what they are going through.”
It was a frank discussion that gave those students something to think about.
It also gave them some simple tools to use in their own lives and the lives of the younger students they will mentor.
To learn more about PALS, click here.
