AUBURN – Vesta Rand and Andrea have been matched as Big Sister and Little Sister for six years under the Child Health Center’s Big Brothers Big Sisters Program. They are celebrating January as Mentoring Month.

Rand, a retired teacher from Webster School, said, “Andrea’s and my match has the right ingredients for an enduring friendship – trust, appreciation, resourcefulness, understanding, sincerity and hope.

“In the six years a rich bond has developed with participation in travel, the arts, pleasurable activities such as cooking, baking, attending historical talks, harvesting raspberries, attending plays and movies. It is always a treat to hang out’ with one another and engage in girly-girl’ conversation, since my own family is made up of all men, animals included.”

The Child Health Center offers school-based and community-based Big Brothers Big Sisters Mentoring Programs throughout Androscoggin, Oxford, northern Cumberland and southern Franklin counties. In 2005 more than 700 children were matched with a volunteer who acted as a mentor.

Andrea, a high school freshman, said, “What I like most about the match is our friendship. From the beginning of our union, we were friends. Now, we are the best of friends.”

As their friendship has grown over the years so has Andrea. She attributes the match to helping her accomplish many things such as better grades in school. In school Andrea enjoys chorus and has taken her experience as a “little” to become one of few freshmen selected for mentoring. She is now a second-generation “Big” in the school-based mentoring program.

Anyone who would like to learn more about mentoring should call the Child Health Center at 782-5437.

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