Deconstructing serendipity: Focus, purpose, and authorship in lunch buddy mentoring

Lunch buddy mentoring is a particular kind of school‐based mentoring program: college student mentors meet twice weekly during school lunch with mentees, and a new mentor is provided each semester. The program is designed to benefit elementary school children who are highly aggressive or chronically bullied. Novel to lunch buddy mentoring is a deemphasis on the strength and length of the relationship as mechanisms of change. It is thought that lunch buddy mentoring operates through provisions that are temporally proximal and context specific. Proposed are two key mechanisms: enhanced social reputation among lunchtime peers and positive interactions with lunchtime peers. Cavell and Henrie describe how lunch buddy mentoring fits within the conceptual framework of focus, purpose, and authorship.