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Benefits of Peer Mentoring for Students:
Peer mentorship offers multiple benefits to your student population. Below are some of the benefits of peer mentorship for your students.
Positive Role Models
Peer mentoring gives the mentee a positive role model who can share relevant and timely advice to help them be successful at college.
Professional Development
Participating in a peer mentoring program gives students an opportunity to develop networking, time-management, and leadership skills that will serve them greatly in the professional world.
Personal Skills Growth
Peer-to-peer mentoring gives students a non-judgmental environment where they can improve interpersonal and communication skills.
Resume Builder
It can be tough to identify valuable experience to add to a resume immediately following graduation. Serving as a peer mentor is an excellent way to demonstrate a commitment to continuous improvement and leadership.
Benefits of Peer Mentorship Programs for Higher Education Institutions:
Peer mentorship offers multiple benefits to higher education institutions. Below are some of the benefits of peer mentorship for your institution.
Promotes Student Success
A strong peer mentorship program will enhance the student experience and improve overall performance inside and outside of the classroom (Shaki & Carter, 2016).
Drives Student Retention
When students are involved in a program that improves their understanding of course studies and gives them an opportunity to build relationships, they are more likely to be motivated to continue, meaning higher retention rates for institutions (Lane 2018).
Creates a Culture of Belonging & Inclusion
Students who build relationships in a mentoring program feel more connected to their peers and gain an overall sense of pride in their school.
Helps You Understand Students’ Biggest Challenges & Concerns
Peer mentoring offers administrators an additional way to gain student voice insights, expanding their understanding of what is top-of-mind for mentees. You’ll gain valuable insight that will help you make informed decisions about how to best support your students.
Increases Capacity for Action
Establishing a peer mentorship program should not add to staff burnout, it should cultivate a solid group of people who are willing to be an extension of staff when called upon.
Peer mentorship is a recognized high-impact practice because it can help students navigate college life while offering the psychosocial support that differentiates mentorship from the relationship a student might have with an advisor or tutor. This support, according to Engstrom & Tinto (2018) and Strayhorn (2007) is associated with positive term-to-term persistence and is especially crucial for historically underserved students.
In practice, peer mentors provide support that extends beyond academics or extracurriculars. They offer a friendly and welcoming ear to questions. They provide guidance tailored to the student’s needs and can encourage help-seeking behaviors that will serve the student long beyond college. They are proof of what is possible.
Identify Your Peer Mentoring Program Goals
How do you measure success in a mentorship program? Before you dive in, it’s crucial to begin with clearly identified outcomes. Afterall, if you don’t know where you’re going, how can you work to get there? Setting goals for your program not only keeps you focused amid a barrage of data, but can unify stakeholders at your institution.
You can start by asking the simple question, “What do we hope to achieve?”
The question is simple, but the answer usually produces a wide range:
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Make sure students graduate and find meaningful jobs and careers
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Give students access to personalized education
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Better address students’ needs and the equity gap
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Increase student engagement
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Identify top concerns and topics during key time periods in the campus experience
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Foster sense of belonging and academic self-efficacy
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Increase student retention by identifying specific student retention strategies
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Relieve staff burnout
Most often, measurable goals come from understanding student retention rates and finding a way to quantify a student’s sense of belonging.
Design Your Mentoring Program
Designing a successful peer mentorship program should come from research, goal setting, and optimization. It’s true, intentional program design is the foundation of high-impact mentorship programs. This could come in the form of a mentoring platform, revamping an existing program, or your own ideation.
But where do you start?
Brainstorm! It starts by putting ideas to paper and identifying the flow of your mentoring program.
Keep in mind your institution’s goals and how the program fits into the bigger picture. From there, you should be thinking about:
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When you plan to launch
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Expectations for the program and participants
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How you will match mentors and mentees
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How you will measure success
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Student retention strategies
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Identifying program goals
It’s also important to consider your audience. 92% of higher education institutions are failing to enroll and graduate students from historically marginalized communities at equitable rates to the general population. Is this something your institution needs to address?
Who will benefit the most from a peer mentorship program?
A lot of higher education institutions think about leveraging peer mentorship programs as a tool to help incoming students, first-year and transfer students, to acclimate into the new environment. Peer mentorship programs have also been used to effectively support students who have been historically underrepresented and marginalized within higher education.
First-year students, international students, first generation higher education students, students of color, students from low-income families….
And while it’s crucial to think about the population who will most benefit, it’s equally important to design your program in a way that supports every student.
Recruit Mentors for Your Mentoring Program
Burnout. Capacity maxed. Turnover. Do these words resonate with your staff? Academic advising is a critical student support, but can be limited when it comes to one-on-one availability. Two-thirds of primary role advisors are responsible for 150 or more students. Higher education is experiencing high burnout and turnover among faculty and staff, making any solution that requires significant staff investment unrealistic in the short-term. It can be difficult to think about new initiatives to support your big picture when you’re feeling overwhelmed and stretched thin.
However… a peer mentorship program can actually increase your staff capacity and minimize burnout and turnover. A structured peer mentorship program is a compelling addition to advising for improving student support – mentorships are individualized, the program can be scaled to impact many students, and it can drive results at a lower cost than hiring more advisors.
We also know students are more likely to share with and feel a connection to their peers than to staff or faculty, making advising and peer mentorship truly complementary to building a robust support system for students.
Finding volunteer mentors is much easier when you provide the means to activate their desire to do more good and help them understand the benefit to their career growth. All you need to do is empower them by centralizing best practices and technology infrastructure.
But where do you start?
Brainstorm! It starts by putting ideas to paper and identifying the flow of your mentoring program.
Keep in mind your institution’s goals and how the program fits into the bigger picture. From there, you should be thinking about:
-
When you plan to launch
-
Expectations for the program and participants
-
How you will match mentors and mentees
-
How you will measure success
-
Student retention strategies
-
Identifying program goals
It’s also important to consider your audience. 92% of higher education institutions are failing to enroll and graduate students from historically marginalized communities at equitable rates to the general population. Is this something your institution needs to address?
Who will benefit the most from a peer mentorship program?
A lot of higher education institutions think about leveraging peer mentorship programs as a tool to help incoming students, first-year and transfer students, to acclimate into the new environment. Peer mentorship programs have also been used to effectively support students who have been historically underrepresented and marginalized within higher education.
First-year students, international students, first generation higher education students, students of color, students from low-income families….
And while it’s crucial to think about the population who will most benefit, it’s equally important to design your program in a way that supports every student.
Train Mentors to Support Your Peer Mentorship Program
While anyone can be a mentor, not all aspiring mentors have every skill needed to develop a successful mentor relationship. That’s why peer mentor training programs should offer your future mentors the flexibility to participate where and when they are able while providing them the resources and skills they need to be successful.
Consider the following:
Flexible training: Whether it’s self-paced or instructor-led, make sure the training you offer has enough options to include anyone and everyone who might be interested. Doing so will expand your pool of applicants to include commuters, online learners, student workers, and adult learners with work or parenting obligations.
Skills-Based Training: Develop programs that build the skills it takes to be a successful mentor. Doing so will increase your student engagement and overall program success. After training, mentors should feel confident in their ability to mentor because they’re equipped with vital skills like active listening and boundary setting. They’ll also know when and how to ask for support from administrators when a mentee’s needs fall outside of their role as a mentor.
Training Incentive: While there is naturally great value in a mentorship program for the mentee, it’s important to remind your mentors of the value they’ll gain too. Things like professional development, critical networking opportunities, and leadership opportunities will serve their ultimate career goals.
Recruit Mentees for Your Mentoring Program
What is a mentorship program without mentees? When the program launches, there’s bound to be natural enthusiasm, especially from those who have been waiting for a 1:1 connection. But how do you capture student attention quickly and reach students who historically miss or do not engage with peer mentoring programs and have the most to gain?
Developing an effective marketing strategy will be a defining moment for the overall success of your program as you work to recruit mentees.
You’ll want to:
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Identify and clearly communicate the benefits for both mentees and mentors
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Gain buy-in from key stakeholders within your institution who will serve as validators of the program
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Determine the most effective channels to get the mentoring program opportunity in front of students in a way that builds excitement amongst their peers
Once you’ve recruited a solid group of mentors and mentees, it’s crucial to keep them engaged. In order for your mentorship program to truly impact key metrics, like student retention and sense of belonging, mentees and mentors need to interact and get to know one another. Plan ahead to share suggestions and information that will help them get the most out of your mentorship program.
Recruit Mentees for Your Mentoring Program
There’s so much more to matching mentors and mentees in a mentorship program than schedule availability and demographics. A mismatched mentor-mentee could turn both off to future involvement or leave one participant ghosted. A strong mentor-mentee relationship can cultivate a sense of belonging, which is important because belonging is an essential aspect of psychological functioning (Allen, Hattie, Kelly, Kern, Vella-Brodrick, Waters, 2018). You’ll want to consider life experiences and how participants identify in the world in addition to their career interests, demographics and socioeconomic background. When possible, invite participants to share what they want in a mentor.
This is best accomplished through a data-driven approach, like leveraging surveys or polls. While you can offer the opportunity for mentees to choose their own mentor, this often presents challenges around biases as well as managing the supply/demand of mentors and mentees. Using a survey-based approach has the added benefit that it can often be automated.
After they’re paired, get your participants talking! You can do this by encouraging the mentor to start the first conversation as soon as possible. This increases student engagement from the get-go. Remember, trust needs to be built in order for mentees to feel comfortable confiding in their mentors. Logged conversations through Mentor Collective programs show that the first few weeks participants are simply getting to know each other. The sooner you can get your mentorships engaged, the more likely you’ll be on your way to increases in student retention.
Launch Your Peer Mentoring Program
Taking the next step to launch your mentorship program can sometimes feel like pushing the big red button. You have all the pieces in place, you’re ready to go, but it can feel overwhelming to take it live.
As it is with any new initiative, it can be beneficial to start small. Kick-off with a pilot mentoring program and ask for feedback at every step. You’ll gain valuable insight from a smaller group. It also gives you the ability to build interest in your mentorship program, so you’ll have students lining up to join before you’ve even begun an institution-wide recruitment effort.
Scale Your Peer Mentoring Program
Starting your mentoring program with a pilot group will help you scale for growth. You’ll learn what works and what doesn’t. Plus, it will give you the ability to identify reasonable expectations for growing your program.
For mentoring programs to become a scalable, sustainable part of your institution’s culture and operating system, they must be effective. Mentoring platforms that can demonstrate measurable impact on outcomes like enrollment, persistence, retention, engagement, and sense of belonging can unite disparate stakeholders across the institution, as well as provide valuable data for administrators seeking funding through grants.
Intentional assessment provides effective data and meaningful analysis can help institutions continuously improve their programs. In practice, this means any investment in technology and resources should begin with clearly identified outcomes.