Evaluation of Mentoring for Early Career Chemistry Teachers (MECCT) Pilot
Information sheet for schools Privacy Notice for Mentoring for Early Career Chemistry Teachers
The Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) is funding the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) to deliver a pilot mentoring project pairing early career chemistry teachers in year two to five of teaching with external mentors.
It is intended that the mentoring will: increase teachers’ confidence, chemistry subject and pedagogical content knowledge; support their management of workload and stress; make them feel more supported; and ultimately improve rates of retention.
The evaluation is being undertaken between December 2018 and March 2020 and will involve 40 pairs of mentors and mentees. Mentor and mentee pairs are expected to meet at least six times over the year for up to an hour each time. However, the exact number of meetings will vary depending on mentees’ preferences. Communication will ideally take place face-to-face, but can also be via Skype, phone, email and other forms of social media.
The National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) is undertaking the external process evaluation of the MECCT pilot which includes:
- a baseline and end-point survey of mentees
- ten school case studies, including a telephone interview with a mentee, their head of department/line manager and their mentor
- mentors completing a log of their interactions with their mentee
- interviews with RSC staff delivering the pilot
- observation of mentor training.