Ella Bento Named Health Mentor of the Year
Ella Bento was named Health Mentor of the Year at Evolve’s annual conference this month, recognising her first year mentoring care-experienced children and young people across Wirral Virtual School’s six settings.
The numbers behind the programme Ella works on are the strongest in Evolve’s portfolio this year. Mentees gained 13.0% on combined wellbeing scores, against a comparison group of similar pupils who received no mentoring and barely moved. The effect size, 1.22, is the largest Evolve has recorded on any measure, roughly 6 times what most school-based interventions achieve.
Attendance tells the same story. Mentees were the only group across the 6 schools whose attendance did not decline this year, averaging 96.4% against 89.8% for their classmates.
The strongest evidence of impact sits in who is paying for it. The Virtual School funded the programme directly in year one. This year, all 6 schools chose to fund their own place through Pupil Premium Plus.
In Ella’s words:
“It has been a rewarding first year with the company, made possible by excellent support from all the staff at my host schools and the stellar training and guidance offered by my managers and friends at Evolve. It is a real honour to have my efforts recognised at the end of a successful yet often challenging year.”
She thanked Rebecca Jackson and Corrina Griffiths, who presented the award, along with John Bishop and all of her Evolve colleagues for their support through the year.
Ella continues with Wirral Virtual School into her second year.