Course-Embedded Mentoring for First-Year Students: Melding Academic Subject Support with Role Modeling, Psycho-Social Support, and Goal Setting - TA

Authors

Jim Henry, University of Hawai'i at MänoaFollow
Holly Bruland, University of Hawaii ManoaFollow
Jennifer Sano-Franchini, Michigan State UniversityFollow

Abstract

This article examines a mentoring initiative that embedded advanced students in first-year composition courses to mentor students to excel to the best of their abilities. Mentors attended all classes along with students and conducted many out-of-class individual conferences, documenting each of them using program-implemented work logs. Four hundred four first-year students provided end-of-term anonymous feedback on standardized forms, which were transcribed, digitized, and tabulated for analysis. Analysis showed that the mentoring was effective in providing the four constructs key to mentoring as identified by Nora and Crisp (2008): psychological/emotional support; support for setting goals and choosing a career path; academic subject knowledge support aimed at advancing a student's knowledge relevant to his or her chosen field; specification of a role model. Analysis also revealed a key construct not mentioned by Nora and Crisp: the mentee’s predisposition. Recommendations for implementing embedded mentoring for first-year students in other contexts follow the Discussion.

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.

Recommended Citation

Henry, Jim; Bruland, Holly; and Sano-Franchini, Jennifer (2011) "Course-Embedded Mentoring for First-Year Students: Melding Academic Subject Support with Role Modeling, Psycho-Social Support, and Goal Setting - TA," International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning: Vol. 5: No. 2, Article 16.
Available at: https://doi.org/10.20429/ijsotl.2011.050216