Creating Lasting Mentorships
Partnering Mentors and Mentees
It’s almost the start of the school year. You have a bunch of new teachers joining your school for the coming year. Either because of the mandates of your district or the culture of your school, you need to set them up with mentors for the first year. Mentorship is a great way for mentees to get acquainted and feel comfortable in the school in a professional and personal way. For mentors, it means taking a leadership role by taking a mentee under their wing. A good mentor is a teacher who doesn’t just meet or exceed pedagogical expectations, but someone who others regard as a collaborative and positive person; a teacher who has continuously shown their dedication to the school community.
As most of the time mentors must come from a pool of tenured teachers, you think about who of your mentored teachers can take on this role, (which does entail some extra work for the mentor). Some schools grant teachers a teaching period for mentorship but many don’t, and mentorship conversations take place during lunches and preparation periods. You mentally browse through the teachers and find the perfect mentor for each new teacher, a mentor who will help them grow professionally, gain confidence in their new school and develop positive relationships with students. Job done!
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What if you can’t choose a right mentor for every new teacher?
What do you prioritize in order to provide every new teacher with the mentorship experience they deserve? Here are some questions that may cross your mind:
· Do I ask a single tenured teacher to work with multiple teachers?
· Do several teachers double up?
· Do I prioritize the teachers who have the best evaluations?
· Should the mentors be teachers who demonstrate excitement at the new direction of the school?
· Can I just have all the department leaders be mentors?
· Do I trust the mentors who have already been mentors before and know what to expect?
· I have a great teacher who’s only been at my school for a year…should they be a mentor?
These are valuable questions. Where do your priorities lie?
First and foremost, you need to fall back on your vision. What is your vision and what are your core values as a leader? What are the core values of your school? Digging deep into these core values can focus your decision making. Are your values aligned with teacher leadership? With community? With excellence? You decision will not just affect the mentor and mentee that you partner together. This decision, like many others, will signify what you value to the staff. Thus, it's important to create partnerships that are aligned with the values and vision that are important to your school community.
To help you in the process, I’ll present you with some considerations as you go through each question.
· Do I ask a single tenured teacher to work with multiple teachers?
I would recommend against this and here are 3 reasons why.
1. One, this can overload the teacher already responsible for teaching classes and everything this entails. New teachers often need support with unit planning and classroom management, but each new teacher will have different gifts and different areas in which they need support. Even if you’re willing to relieve this teacher from some periods of instruction, it can be too much for the teacher to handle.
2. Think about the message that this sends to all the teachers at your school. Do you only trust one person to work with new teachers out of everybody on your staff? Are no other teachers equipped to mentor new teachers, particularly if you have staff who are tenured, experienced, and do well on evaluations. Even if you’re a new principal who doesn’t yet have the support of the entire staff, it’s especially important to use this as an opportunity to demonstrate that your leadership is democratic, inclusive, and just. In the long run, these attributes will garner support for your leadership. Moreover, these are the attributes that you want your blossoming staff to experience as well.
3. Consider the specific needs of your new teachers. The role of the confidant cannot be overstated in the area of mentorship. If you truly want to create an environment in which new teachers can grow professionally as well as personally, it is important that they have a partner teacher who looks out for them and can help guide them through social situations with students and adults they may not have experienced before. The confidentiality, expressed and maintained, is a requirement for the vulnerability that the success of this partnership is founded on. If the mentor teacher also mentors many other teachers, a new teacher can have some reason to subconsciously (or outright) doubt the confidentiality of their relationship.
Do several teachers double up?
I would recommend against this for the same reasons outlined in the first question. If you do find that this absolutely needs to be the case, then consider personalities and classroom placements. Sometimes mentoring co-teachers has benefits, including planning with both mentees at the same time. This will depend on the nature of the relationship of the co-teaching pair. In contrast, if there is tension between the co-teachers, the teacher mentoring both can be torn between two points of view and unsure how to help, leading to the disintegration of trust between the mentees and mentor. (I would also recommend against partnering 2 new teachers together to co-teach.)
Do I prioritize the teachers who have the best evaluations?
Given your evaluations are fair and transparent, I would use them as a factor, not as the basis for a final decision. Instructional prowess is key, but the way potential mentors function in the social space of the school is important as well. You want a mentor who will model building relationships with students as well as adults.
Should the mentors be teachers who demonstrate excitement at the new direction of the school?
Yes, if you can, overwhelmingly so. However, if there is a serious divide between your new direction and some experienced staff who are not yet aligned with your leadership, I would recommend choosing mentors from this pool as well (there are some caveats). If you’re afraid their negative attitude will spread to the new teacher, know that you, not the mentor is ultimately responsible for the growth of the new teachers. This gives you’re the opportunity to host learning sessions and demonstrate ways that the values of your leadership are positively impacting the school.
Can I just have all the department leaders be mentors?
If your department leaders are already facilitating meetings, coaching teachers, planning curricula, and teaching (or some of the above), they probably don’t have much time for mentorship. Also, given the hierarchy, your department leaders shouldn’t be the default mentors because this may cause a social barrier between new teachers and the teachers in the department.
Do I trust the mentors who have already been mentors before and know what to expect?
For schools to succeed, they need to be adaptive to change and growth. Consider is where you are where you want to grow?
I have a great teacher who’s only been at my school for a year…should they be a mentor?
Good teachers may or may not be good mentors. There are teachers who are collaborative and unifying in every space they’re in and this is an attribute of a good mentor. Think about how this teacher works will all the other teachers. Do they give and receive respect from the rest of the community?
I hope this provided you with some insight on choosing new mentors. Every school is different, and every community must face concerns of its own when creating a partnership between a mentor and mentee. You know your school and so you’re in the best position to create partnerships that last well beyond the first year of a teacher’s career.
If you’re interested in really developing your mentorship program, building teacher leaders, and creating a lasting impact on your students, I created a customizable year long program for new teachers and teacher leaders to learn, thrive, and grow together.