FEAT Parent Mentor Program:

Our “Feat” have walked the walk and talked the talk! A parent mentor is a parent with two or more years of personal experience on the autism journey. Mentors provide general advice and assistance to new families with regards to evidence based treatments, diets, education, and community resources. Our program is specific to the southern Nevada autism community and supports our mission: Our mission is to provide information on treatment resources for families with children diagnosed with autism, autism spectrum disorder (ASD), and related disorders. We provide support, encouragement, and guidance to parents and create an opportunity for them to benefit from contact with other parents with similar needs and concerns.

Screening

Mentors will fill out an intake application. Mentors will be chosen by the FEAT Executive Director during the first initial year of the program. Personal and community connections of the ED will also help in determining the initial 5 mentors.

Mentees will fill out an intake application. Mentees are any family that has a child diagnosed on the autism spectrum looking for additional autism support living in southern Nevada.

Experience

FEAT Mentors are volunteer parents who have a child on the spectrum and a minimum of two years’ experience into their autism journey. FEAT mentors must also be a member of FEAT for a minimum of two years and be familiar with FEAT services and supports.

Training

All FEAT Mentors must go through a mandatory training before being matched with a new family. FEAT will provide quarterly trainings that cover new therapies, treatments or other relevant topics to help keep FEAT Mentors up to date and informed on subjects that they may not have dealt with in regards to their own child.

Support

FEAT has many tools to help support our FEAT Mentors such as:

• Quarterly Mentor trainings
• Same-day email support
• Call-in hotline for urgent help (702-368-3328 or 702-403-6263 Spanish)
• FEAT Website www.featsonv.org
• UNLV Autism Guide (co-sponsored by FEAT)
• Daily social media posts (Facebook)
• Monthly support meetings (first Monday of every month
• Monthly Spanish Support meetings (First Friday of every month)

Targeted Mentor Matches

Mentees and Mentors are matched on many possible criteria and information from the initial intake application, such as locality, language spoken, therapies, specific medical issues or treatment, age and much more, depending on what the Mentee family needs. Families need Mentors who have “walked the walk and talked the talk” and have gotten their kids into a good place before helping new families. This means the Mentors have learned how to find resources, learned basic laws, how to navigate the local school district, connect with advocates, provide information on evidence based therapies and is knowledgeable in all of FEAT events, support services, trainings and family events.