How the Mentoring Program Works
The Beginning Teacher and Administrator Mentoring Program is administered by local Project Partnership Leads throughout the state of Oregon. The leads coordinate the mentors, who provide 90 hours of individualized support to first- and second-year teachers and administrators, developing an effective educator force that is responsive to the diverse academic needs and cultural backgrounds of all students.
The Oregon Department of Education (ODE) provides training for beginning teacher mentors and mentors of beginning administrators. Click here for an extensive list of links to their resources. Training is also provided to the project directors. Mentors receive training throughout the school year from the New Teacher Center (NTC) at the University of California, Santa Cruz based on NTC models for teacher and school leader induction. The NTC has over 20 years of experience training mentors throughout the United States.
The Oregon Mentoring Program provides two levels of training-one for experienced teachers and administrators and a second track, for new teachers and administrators. NTC training revolves around the components of professional development and assessment. The ongoing training provides practical tools for new teachers and administrators. In addition to the trainings, mentors are regularly in touch with the new teachers and administrators providing guidance, troubleshooting and observation – all with the goal of supporting teachers (and administrators) in their profession.
Training for Mentors
The NTC training and assessment for administrator mentors includes the following:
- Understand the learning and support needs of new administrators
- Learn and practice a variety of mentoring/coaching strategies and skills designed to meet the needs of coaches serving new school administrators
- Access a variety of tools and resources specific to the needs of new administrators
- Understand the characteristics of a well-designed, mentoring/coaching-based program of leadership development for new administrators
- Become part of a new learning community of leadership mentors/coaches
- Understand how mentoring/coaching can accelerate the new administrators ability to impact student achievement
- Enhance their confidence and competence as educational leaders
The NTC training and assessment for teacher mentors includes the following:
Year 1
- Foundations in mentoring and formative assessment – which equips mentors with fundamental knowledge, skills and understandings critical for those who work with beginning teachers
- Coaching and observation strategies – which aids mentors in the process of collection of observation data related to professional teaching standards and ways data can be shared to improve new teacher instructional practice
- Analysis of student work – which outlines the principles of adult learning and strategies in coaching new teachers as they use student work to guide instructional planning
- Planning and designing professional development for new teachers – which suggests strategies to help bring new teachers together for meaningful and responsive learning
Year 2
- Coaching in Complex Situations Processes and tools for understanding complex coaching situations and building mentor capacity to support a variety of professional learning styles and needs; applications to current case of practice
- Mentoring for Equity Framework for mentoring beginning teachers on how race, language, and culture issues influence teaching and learning
- Extending Equity: Supporting Academic English Success Analysis of mentoring practice data for discovery of equity issues; supports for new teacher assessment of and teaching for academic language learning
- Teachers of Teachers Processes and tool for developing mentor leadership skills that advocate for and influence new teacher mentoring and induction programs
