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The number of students attending public universities is increasing in the United States. These students are diverse in terms of age, ethnicity, socio-economic status, and academic abilities. Some are the first in their families to attend college. These varied backgrounds and experiences often result in students who are under-prepared for college. Increasing academic success and retention of students are a constant struggle at many institutions of higher education. The current study investigated the academic performance (GPA) and retention rates of freshmen students who were part of the mentoring program at Mississippi State University. The results indicated that students who were part of the mentoring program performed better academically and also were retained at a higher rate than that of those students were not part of the mentoring program. Incoming college freshmen need access to as many university resources as possible, such as mentoring to aid them in successfully acclimating both academically and socially. Efforts should focus on encouraging faculty interaction beyond the classroom via mentoring. This mentoring interaction will help incoming students not only with a higher GPA, but also with a better chance at remaining at college and ultimately graduating.

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The purpose of this study was to determine the value, if any, of a mentoring program for beginning U.S. Army Reserve Forces School instructors, specifically: how mentored and unmentored beginning instructors differ in their perception of a mentorship program, how do mentors improve, if at all, the beginner's instructional practice, how mentors assist the beginner's understanding of the school's operating procedures, and how formally and informally mentored instructors differ in their perception of a mentorship program. Army Reserve instructors teaching the Command and General Staff Course (CGSOC) and the Combined Arms Services Staff Course (CAS3), were the subjects for this study. The total population of 267 instructors was surveyed by questionnaire, 217 (81.3%) usable responses were received. ANOVA and t-test statistic calculations showed a significant difference between the mean responses of instructors with a formal mentor and those with an informal or no mentor. Instructors with formal mentors strongly agree that mentorship is beneficial to beginners and should be part of an induction program. Formal mentors helped improve practice through observation, feedback, counseling, and direct assistance. Instructors with formal mentors state they were provided an orientation into administrative, logistical, and standard operating procedures. Finally, the formally mentored group report they were helped to become better instructors, guided in professional development, given a formal assessment of their instructional abilities, and provided materials to improve practice and maintain competence. The data appear to suggest that a formal mentorship program produces a more prepared beginning instructor. / Ed. D.

Capstone courses provide senior students in engineering with a culminating experiential learning environment, allowing them to apply the knowledge they have developed throughout their undergraduate education. Through anecdotal descriptions of the course, faculty roles have been classified as mentoring. Yet, there have been few systematic and empirical studies that aid in the exploration of the pedagogy and its effectiveness. This study used Kram's model of mentoring as a lens to explore mentoring in the capstone course more systematically. In addition, the learning theories that support project-based learning provided additional understanding into the functions and practices that faculty mentors use to support the students' career and psychosocial development. This study used a sequential mixed methods design to explore the prominent mentoring functions seen in engineering capstone courses, identify the factors related to those mentoring functions, and analyze how the functions are related to perceived learning outcomes. Data collection included a survey of 491 capstone faculty, interviews of 25 survey respondents using the critical decision method, and a survey of 139 students of the interviewees. Quantitative data analysis included the calculation of descriptive statistics for the faculty and student survey item responses as well as a correlation analyses between the items representing mentoring functions and items representing factors of mentoring. Qualitative analysis involved a phenomenological analysis of the data through the coding of interview responses using Kram's mentoring functions as a framework. Findings identified the mentoring practices associated with the career development and psychosocial functions. Additional findings indicated that: 1) challenging assignments, protection, and acceptance-and-confirmation are the dominant functions, 2) faculty background is a potential important factor of mentoring, whereas institutional and department demographics are negligible, and 3) most learning outcomes are associated with challenging assignments, with the exception of ethical understanding, which is developed through coaching, counseling, and role modeling. The findings resulted in the development of a model of capstone mentoring. The model provides a holistic, research-based view of the role that faculty assume when mentoring capstone students. While this study did not systematically prove the model's effect on student learning, positive effects are supported by both student self-reports and learning theories associated with project-based learning. As such, the model can be used as a general guide for the development of pedagogical skills and assessment of teaching practices in project-based capstone courses. / Ph. D.

According to the U. S. Department of Education (National Commission on Teaching and America's Future, 1996), U.S. public schools will hire an estimated two million teachers within the decade. The experience of the beginning teacher is a stressful one with more than 40% of new teachers choosing to leave the profession during the first three years. One promising practice to address this problem is mentoring, an expert teacher helping the beginner one-on-one. The heart of mentoring is the mentor/mentee relationship. This study investigated the nature of the beginning teacher/mentor relationship and the forces that affected that relationship. The methodology was a cross-case analysis of three pairs of mentor/mentees at the elementary level. The data were collected from focus groups, teacher interviews, observations, email responses, and document review. Data were analyzed using a constant comparative method examining emerging themes across all three cases. Trustworthiness of the research was fostered through multiple sources of data, practice interviews, oversight by peers and committee, participant review, and description of themes in the participants' own words. The data revealed that the mentor/mentee pairs developed very strong relationships grounded on reassurance, collaboration, reciprocity, friendship, problem solving, multi-layered support, and informal structures for getting together. Positive forces affecting the relationships included personality of the participants, perception of mentor role, closeness of age, proximity of classrooms, and common teaching assignment. Time constraints acted as a negative force that presented many challenges addressed by mentors and their mentees in very unique ways. / Ph. D.

The perceptions of how well the mentor teacher program meets the needs of the beginning teacher, the mentor teacher, and the school division were examined in this study. There were three populations: 100 beginning teachers employed in the Newport News Public Schools with an initial employment date of August 1998, 56 mentor teachers, and 31 program administrators. Three surveys, utilizing Likert scales, were developed to collect data. Descriptive statistics were applied to the data. Data from the three populations were analyzed separately. Each set of data was disaggregated by age, gender, ethnicity, years of experience, position, educational level, and career status. Means were compared to identify differences in the perceptions of the program's effectiveness. The overall conclusion was that the program is only modestly meeting the needs of beginning teachers and mentors. In the perception of administrators, the program is meeting the needs of the school division. The data are quite clear that the closer one is to the classroom (the beginning teacher) the lower one rates the mentoring program. The beginning teachers rated the program the lowest, with mentors rating it next lowest and administrators rating it the highest. Numerous strengths and areas needing improvement were identified in the assessment. Among the strengths were sufficient emotional support from mentors, assistance with policies and procedures of the school and division, help with instructional methods, and training for mentors. Among the areas needing improvement were sufficient time for mentoring and receiving assistance; support for such activities as stimulating student learning, conducting home visits, organizing the classroom, and achieving the Virginia Standards of Learning; compensating mentors adequately; and assigning mentors to beginning teachers who teach the same grade or content. The data may be useful in guiding modifications in the mentoring program of the Newport News Public Schools or in developing an effective mentoring program in any school system. / Ed. D.

Boston University. University Professors Program Senior theses. / PLEASE NOTE: Boston University Libraries did not receive an Authorization To Manage form for this thesis. It is therefore not openly accessible, though it may be available by request. If you are the author or principal advisor of this work and would like to request open access for it, please contact us at open-help@bu.edu. Thank you. / 2999-01-02

An important predictor of the success of a peer-mentoring program is the quality of the relationship between the peer mentor and the mentee. A previous study identified target outcomes, operationally defined target behaviors, and developed a computer-based instruction (CBI) training module to teach peer mentors relationship skills. The previous study suggested that the CBI training module increased target behaviors in pre-and post-tests that were typed. The current study replicated and extended the previous study with additional participants and analyzed responding during a video-chat generalization assessment. We observed an increase in target behaviors during the CBI post-test for 7 out of 8 modules across two participants and an increase in target behaviors for 5 out of 12 target behaviors across three participants for the generalization assessment. Results suggest that the CBI training modules may be an effective way to teach behaviors that contribute to a high-quality relationship when participants engage in typed responses. However, the extent to which these behaviors generalize to a video-chat generalization assessment may need further research.

Magister Educationis - MEd / Continuous learning has been identified as a key element for SMMEs to succeed in their drive to build productive capacity, to compete, to create jobs and to contribute to poverty alleviation in South Africa. Without the necessary business skills and insight, emerging entrepreneurs will not be able to run their business successfully. Therefore, emerging small business owners especially those in rural areas attend the general, basic, government-subsidized courses provided by non-profit organizations.To ensure that learning is being transferred to the workplace, the Western Cape Business Development Centre (WCBDC) applies the concept of mentoring as a follow-up programme. In layman’s term, a business mentor refers to someone who is experienced in business, trustworthy and professional, trained and up-to-date in their advice.The goal of the research was to evaluate the impact of the WCBDC’s mentoring program on the development of marketing skills of an established small business. I did a case study on one of the successful small businesses in Saldanha, The Marine and Industrial Coaters (MIC), whose owners have attended the Western Cape Business Development Center’s (WCBDC) entrepreneurial development program and then enrolled for its business mentoring programme.Since the mentoring programme commits a substantial amount of resources to mentoring and requires a lot of time from the WCBDC, it is of interest to see whether the expected goals of the mentoring programme – to enhance the entrepreneurs’ business skills and to lead entrepreneurs to business growth – are achieved. I have focused on the development of marketing skills and found that the entrepreneurs’ marketing knowledge and skills did developed as a result of the programme. More efforts need to continue to sustain the existing momentum. However, success in implementing the mentoring programme will depend on essential factors such as selfdirected learning, facilitative and multiple mentoring, application of both psychosocial and career mentoring functions, and shared accountability and responsibility of both mentee and mentor.