Mike is the president of Pass It On - Outdoors Mentor program

Welcome to another edition of Whitetail Rendezvous. Today we’re heading over to Kansas, and we’re going to talk with Mike Christensen. Mike is the president of Pass It On - Outdoors Mentor program. Mike, welcome to the show.

Mike: Bruce, thank you for having me on today.

Bruce: Well, how’s the weather over there in Wichita today?

Mike: We’ve got a beautiful day today. Its going to be in the 50s, a little slight overcast, a great, beautiful day to be outdoors.

Bruce: Well, that's great and Kansas is a great state. It's a got a lot of great bucks, and I want to jump right into Pass It On - Outdoor Mentors program, the hows and the whys and why you got this rolling.

Mike: You know, I got started working with Big Brothers and Big Sisters back in '99. A neighbor of mine worked at Big Brothers and Big Sisters. And when Kansas had their first youth upland season, he knew that I was involved with Quail Unlimited at the time. And he asked if I could round up some guys to take some kids out on that first youth upland season. Well, it was a chance for us to take the dogs out a week before the season opened and see how the birds were looking. So we jumped at it. And I really had no idea what Big Brothers and Big Sisters was all about, but a chance to get outdoors a week early sounded good to me, so away we went.

A couple of years later, we got to where we were doing a couple of hunts a year with these kids, and it was really interesting. The first time we did, I figured we'd take these 14, 15-year-old kids out, and they were going to be walking our tails off. But after the first couple of fields, they were physically exhausted. They couldn't keep up with us old guys. It was really amazing. And the program grew from there.

In 2002, I was hired by Big Brothers and Big Sisters to start up an outdoor-mentoring program for them here in Kansas, and it's been really, really tremendous. We're able to give kids who won't have a chance to go hunting or fishing that opportunity. And we do that by recruiting mentors, men and women, who love the outdoors and want to share those experiences with a kid. And it's really been a tremendously rewarding experience for me.

Bruce: What type of challenges are you having finding mentors, men and women, who want to take an hour or two on a Saturday, or even more time than that, and getting involved in a kid's life?

You know, that's our biggest challenge, Bruce, is finding more mentors

Mike: You know, that's our biggest challenge, Bruce, is finding more mentors. We have literally thousands of kids at Big Brothers and Big Sisters agencies across the country on the waiting list, and 75% of those kids are boys. I'm not going to say that all those boys want to go outdoors and go hunting and fishing, but I'd wager that the [inaudible 00:02:59] and there are a lot of these kids that will never get off the waiting list. They'll never get matched with a mentor. And that was one of the reasons why Big Brothers and Big Sisters here in Kansas was interested in starting an outdoor-mentoring program, because they realized that the demographics of hunters and fishermen are male. And they were willing to try and reach out to that demographic and get them involved with these kids, and it's a win-win situation for everybody.

Those of us who love the outdoors get to expose kids to the outdoors and maybe have future hunters and fishermen. The kids win because now they have a mentor and they get to go outdoors, and the outdoors community wins. It's just a win for everybody, and we just really need to encourage more men and women to step up and help ensure that our outdoor traditions are carried on by these kids.

Bruce: Now when you're looking for mentors, are you branched out throughout the country and have state directors? Tell us about your structure.

Mike: Well, right now we're just really in Kansas.