Mentorship Up Close

I've been talking a lot about mentorship lately. I consider myself fortunate to be a mentor in a variety of settings/circumstances. I am a formal NTIP mentor with my school board, I am a mentor for Google for Education through their certified innovator program, and I am a mentor through OnEdMentors Connect (my reflection on Phase 1 of the OnEdMentors Connect experience below).

Around 10 years ago I expressed interest in becoming a formal mentor with my school board. I contacted the person responsible for mentorship in my board and was told that they had all the mentors they needed. I ended up working with a Vice Principal who had been a formal mentor before becoming an administrator. I asked him if he would be willing to speak to the mentorship gatekeepers on my behalf, thinking that the word of someone they knew would help, no luck.

I recall feeling frustrated. I felt like I was doing a good job in the classroom and was on top of my game (as much as one can be). My Principals were supportive and said that they thought it would be a good idea to be a mentor. It seemed like I had the prerequisites - just wasn't the right time.

Fast forward to the birth of the NTIP program. In our Board the system put out a request for teachers to put their name forward to be added to a list so that new teachers could connect with a mentor of their choice. Prior to this, it seemed like the people running the program would decide who to put together.

Since the roster of mentor teachers was created I have been lucky enough to work with three teachers in my system, one of which decided to make it formal as we had started working together through the digital OnEdMentors Connect initiative. I have to say that I am enjoying the mentor/mentee process and look forward to continuing to assist teachers if and when the opportunity arises.

From the perspective of the Catholic Leadership Framework, being a mentor allows me to work with others in order to set direction, build relationships and develop people, develop the organization to support desired practices, improve instructional programs, and secure accountability.

Setting Direction
The opportunity to work with a new teacher to set a a shared vision - one that includes what our schools and our system value, that energizes our work, and is embedded in the Gospel values - is  beneficial to all stakeholders in education.

Building Relationships and Developing People
The mentor/mentee experience also allows both parties to create a strong professional relationship with room for both parties to grow and develop as educators.

Developing the Organization to Support Desired Practices
From the perspective of a mentor I see my role as one that involves developing the organization by sharing my knowledge and practices to support desired practices that connect to our board's mission, vision, priorities, and improvement plan.

Improving the Instructional Program
From my experience, the time and work that is done around the organization's priorities ends up leading to improving the instructional program. As a mentor my role involves guidance/support on matters involving assessment/evaluation, pedagogy, classroom management, innovation, and anything else that the mentee would like to ask about/work on.

Securing Accountability
Last but not least, discussions about accountability are critical. How are we sharing what we are accountable for and why is it important to do so? Building a sense of internal accountability is important for us as it supports our professional learning and practice. A big one for me lately has been self reflection and how I document my thinking in order to track my development. This is something I share with my mentees, that is if they are interested in the topic.

Can you see why I am so pumped about being a mentor? I really enjoy it. I also enjoy being a mentee. Hopefully I can put together a blog post about being a mentee from afar. It's now been added to the list of things I would like to reflect on!

The RIGHT People (in my opinion)

For the past several years (based on what I can recall) my school board has posted their call for VP pool applications a month or two after the school year gets underway. The same thing happens every year after the posting comes out - emails start getting bounced around between colleagues about whether to apply or not. Part of it is fun and part of it is stressful, but it always gets me thinking about whether I am ready and/or willing to put my name forward to be considered for a formal leadership position in Education.

I recently heard about some of the people that have been successful in making it into the leadership pool. I was ecstatic to hear that some of the people I have been learning with over the last few years were successful in their applications. All of us differ in how we run our classrooms and operate at our school sites but we are all the same with respect to our core beliefs about leadership, particularly in Catholic education.

I feel very good about the time I have spent learning with them and look forward to learning from them as formal leaders in our system. When I think about the experiences I have had with them, and connect those experiences to the Catholic Leadership Framework, I clearly recall the conversations we had and the work we did around building relationships & developing people, improving instructional programs, and developing the organization to support desired practices.

Sean Kritz (Head of Guidance at RCSS) and I moments before recording a webinar about deep learning.
Working to develop the organization and support desired practices.

I feel like they are the RIGHT people for the job and, selfishly, I consider myself fortunate to be connected to them. It makes me think that the work I have been doing and the way I have been thinking are good for the system and that there may be a place for me in formal leadership if I decide to pursue it in my school board.

Don't get me wrong, I have some thoughts and ideas of my own around innovation and disruption that I believe would benefit student learning and achievement but so do my colleagues! It will be fun to see them grow and change as they move out of their current roles and into the main office of a school.

Before I hit "publish" on this post, I want to say thanks to Brian Aspinall for the unintentional nudge on Twitter this morning that led to this post.