Updates...thoughts..etc.

Hey Luke,

Thanks for keeping me in the loop! It looks like you guys ahve made excellent progress! I bet you have already thought of most of this, but these were ideas that I had as I was going through the documents.

Regarding the meeting on the 12th:
>>It all looks pretty good and I would say that most of my comments deal with the chart and your timeline! I would say that an additional goal for the first six/seven months would be for the mentoring scheme show some definitive benefits for the University, staff, and students involved. This would help provide further incentive for the programs to continue! The website is essential! It can also provide a place to put resources for mentors such as tips, handouts, strategies, training, etc.

Mentor Action Plan:
>>Under the "website" > Create Content for website, possibly include resources that would have strategies, tips, possibly training features - this part could be added at a later date though. You could also have the mentoring schemesfeatured once they are set up. For example if the journalism scheme gets started then have the contact information for the program, times and places they meet (if they meet outside of class), mentor bios, etc.
>>Under "Identify," I would also have an application process available for interested students. That way staff can suggest students who would be good and self-motivated students can also apply.
>>Under "Applications," I know you have training later on in the process, but perhaps you could mention in the application process that training will be required from CELT or from the department or programme. I know evaluation is looked at later, but also it could be mentioned that evaulation will also be part of participating in the mentoring scheme.
>>I would make the date for submission fairly quick, but it depends on how many schemes that you guys are trying to luanch for this term. The more you want, the longer I would make the date for submission.
Under the "applications," I would also favor appliactions stemming from programmes that experiences poor retention rates, which I think you mentioned earlier in the meeting mintues.
>>I would also be tempted to get a variety of appliaction from all over the university. So basically, I would want an app;;laiction for the journalism school, nursing school, and engineering school rather than all the journalism school. I think this would help promote the mentoring scheme as more university wide rather than department specific and more applicable to everyone.
>>Under CELT > "Development" - I like the publicizing stuff, that is really good. I think under the eavulaution, you could also look at grades from pervious terms to see the difference...hopefully there would be some. It would also be great to get videos/testimonials at this point to use in future marketing. I also do not know if CELT would be responsible of some of the training, but they could provide generic training as far as what do do in emergencies, different teaching strategies, or even just break out sessions so that different mentors can exchange ideas with one another. This is similar to what you were staying with the bulletins and having the mentor of the week stuff. I think that during some of those meetings with mentors and staff, you can have informal feedback where they offer suggestions on what can be done differently, better, or any new ideas to apply to the mentoring schemes.
>>I do think that some training from the specific school is necessaryy because of the specific content looked at.
>>Under "celebration," I freaking love this idea. This provides good PR for the future and rewards the mentors and the staff. I would perhaps let the participating mentoring schemes know that this was happening at the beginning of the term and maybe even inform them of criteria for the award so that they have something to work towards.
>>At the end of the July period, lots of feedback would be nice to refine the program to make more decisions regarding ratining, promtion, expansion, etc.

I hope that helps and I bet you have thought of most of that already. Let me know if there is anything I can do or develop. I would be more than happy to help! (I kind of wish I was there helping...)

Thanks!

Kirk

PS I apologize for typos, grammatical errors etc...haha

Implementation Plan

Hi Kirk,

Just done this plan to show the stages we need to complete to be able to implement a trial of the mentoring scheme to be run in the new year. Not sure if you will be able to expand this, if not I can send you an email with an attached pdf. file or something. I can't think of much else for it at the moment as my mind as hit a bit of a brick wall this afternoon. Let us know if there is anything you feel we ought to consider,

bye for now,

Luke

Meeting 12/12/11

Hi Kirk,

just thought I'd keep you updated of the latest developments over here. We had a meeting today and I've tried to summarise some of the points discussed here.

Meeting on 12^th December 2011 to discuss the establishment of a mentoring scheme

Attending:

Stuart Brand

Luke Millard

Melissa Tisdale

Jamie Morris

Luke Nagle

Course of Discussion:

What is our goal for the first six/seven months of the mentoring scheme?

> At the end of the first six/seven months of the mentoring scheme we wish to be in a position where we can create some sort of celebration event and award ceremony to showcase the mentors and mentees work and development.

What do we need to be able to get to this position?

> Advertise the mentoring programme to students and staff to raise awareness of its establishment.

> Take applications and allocate funding for successful applications

> Publicise the mentoring schemes as they develop so that the rest of the university community are aware of what is happening.

How can we support and implement the programmes on-going development requirements?

> Establishment of a mentoring website the can be accessed externally but linked in to the Students Union and iCity. (UWE, Aston)
http://www1.aston.ac.uk/current-students/get-involved/peermentoring/
http://www1.uwe.ac.uk/students/studysupport/peerassistedlearning.aspx

> Creation of video clips, possibly animated, advertising benefits of the scheme. (PAL video UWE)

> Shout outs and leaflet hand outs (physical and electronic) at lectures, board of studies and via email to all staff and some students advertising programme and calling for applications.

> Creation of bi-weekly/monthly mentor of the week bullet-ins publicising what that mentor is doing, how they are doing it, positives and negatives etc. in a similar format to the weekly news updates on TigerTV or David Lynch’s Weather Report.

How do we decide what applications are worth funding over the ones that aren’t?

> Demonstration of partnership or student ownership.

> Favouring courses that fall below the satisfaction benchmark for NSS or those that have poor progression and retention figures.

> Favouring applications that address specific modules that are failing.