Word: meckelson
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Whenever he needed advice�while growing up in Yakima, Wash., Doug Meckelson always turned to his grandmother and favorite mentor, Revay Meckelson. She died in 1987, but he found similar sage counsel when he volunteered five years ago at a senior center in San Francisco. "As I listened to these elders," recalls Meckelson, 45, "I thought how great it'd be to set up a website where cybergrandparents could share their life experiences to help others, just as my grandmother had done with...
...volunteer mentors don't receive any counseling training, but they must fill out a questionnaire that seeks to determine how empathetic they are and if they can offer advice without being judgmental. Meckelson says the 50% who make it through that selection process are then encouraged to use common sense in responding to letters that come into the EWC website. The counselors read letters posted on the site and choose the ones they feel best equipped to handle. Once a letter has been selected, it's no longer available to other mentors to answer unless the advice seeker specifically asks...
...Meckelson estimates that "75% of our letters deal with relationship issues." The other 25%, he says, focus on issues like business, career and personal debt. The obvious question, of course, is why so many people would ask a perfect, and unseen, stranger for advice on such sensitive matters. Anonymity, for starters, says David M., 20, a college student who found EWC by going to Google and typing in "free advice." David, who prefers to remain anonymous, says overly critical parents are another factor causing young people to look for outside help. "My father has always been pretty tough...
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