La Crosse Benefits From A Decade Of Mentoring Success

“I can’t tell you how much I value and appreciate having a mentoring relationship like this," says Mai Chao Duddeck, referring to her mentor-mentee relationship with Mary Newgard-Larson. "If I didn't have this experience, I would have quit."

By Amanda N. Wegner
Contributing writer

Fourteen years ago, Kathie Tyser came to a realization. As the coordinator of staff development for the School District of La Crosse at the time, she found that new teachers still had the same questions she had when she was new to the profession: Whom do I talk to about benefits? Where’s my mailbox? How do I deal with lunch money? Parking? The list went on.

“When I came into this district, it took me years to figure out who did what,” said Tyser, who has spent more than 30 years in the district. “I wasn’t connected to the bigger picture.”

Kathie Tyser

So Tyser, now the associate superintendent of instruction, put the wheels in motion for a districtwide mentoring program – nearly 10 years before PI 34 required districts to provide a mentor to Initial Educators. In 1998, four years later, La Crosse, along with the neighboring districts of Onalaska and Holmen, received a grant to put the mentoring programs in place. There was no “crystal ball,” Tyser said, just a desire to help new teachers better than she had been helped.

Tyser, who is set to retire at the end of the school year, said the program is “a legacy I feel good about leaving.”

Like the Appleton Area School District which was featured in the December issue of OnWEAC In Print, the School District of La Crosse has been recognized by the Department of Public Instruction as a “Promising Program,” in part because of its new teacher induction program and related components. As DPI works to enhance the guidelines of PI 34 – including what defines a quality mentoring program – districts, such as Appleton and La Crosse (and in the March issue of OnWEAC In Print, Oconto Falls), offer real-life examples of how these programs can look and how they can work.

Building rapport, growing teachers

A unique and vital aspect of La Crosse’s mentoring program is the use of a mentor consultant, a component of the program that began in 2000. A retired teacher employed by the district, the consultant leads mentor trainings, visits and shares resources and information with new teachers, serves as a bridge between the human resource and staff development departments, and provides continuity for the program.

Hiring a retired teacher, Tyser said, was intentional, especially since the needs are cyclical, with demands on the consultant’s time being greater over the summer and through the first few months of the school year.

Rosemary Burnett

A retired teacher also has “rapport with mentors and mentees, years of experience and passion – passion for the district and the profession,” said Rosemary Burnett, a 24-year teaching veteran who has served as the district’s mentor consultant since retiring in 2005. “That’s important if we’re going to develop and retain new teachers.” Having a dedicated consultant is critical to the success of the program, said Sandy Brauer, the district’s director of curriculum and staff development.

“Rosemary’s role is an important one. If this was just something tacked on to someone’s administrative duties, they wouldn’t have the time to make this their priority, like it should be. This program wouldn’t be as in-depth. She is the eyes and ears and knows what our teachers need to be successful.”

Being a consultant makes her position “rather neutral, and all parties benefit from that,” Burnett added.

To keep the neutrality, Burnett does not pair mentors and mentees; this is the responsibility of building principals, as location is an important part of the equation in creating the right match. Principals also strive to pair mentors and mentees who have similar prep times. The mentor-mentee relationship spans one school year in La Crosse.

A perfect match

Mai Chao Duddeck couldn’t be happier with her mentor match, Mary Newgard-Larson. Duddeck is in her second year of teaching, but the 2007-’08 school year is her first year in the La Crosse district. Coming from a smaller school district, Duddeck, an ELL teacher at Central High School, is convinced that “if I didn’t have this experience, I would have quit.”

“It’s night and day,” Duddeck said of the difference between the mentoring structure at her previous school and what La Crosse offers. “There, we didn’t have a relationship. They were not supportive – it was more that they were obligated to take you under their wing, check things off a list. I can’t tell you how much I value and appreciate having a mentoring relationship like this.”

Mentor-mentee pairs do have checklists in La Crosse, which are turned in to Burnett and Brauer, but it’s more a resource than anything else, said Newgard-Larson. Pairs are encouraged to meet and communicate informally, instead of waiting for a monthly meeting to check things off the list. In fact, Duddeck and Newgard-Larson agreed, it’s the quick connections they find the most valuable.

“Because of the pace of this building, it’s difficult to find extended time together,” said Newgard-Larson, an English teacher with 20-plus years of experience. “So the time we do have is valuable. It might be a quick e-mail or stop in the hall. Sometimes it only takes two minutes to pass on a great idea or get an affirmation.”

Mentors and mentees are also treated to a casual afternoon gathering before the school year starts to get acquainted on a personal level.

For the 2007-’08 school year, there are 15 Initial Educators paired with mentors. Mentors receive training and a stipend for their additional duties. Teachers new to the district – but not to teaching – have an informal mentor, Brauer said. Informal mentors are not compensated.

“You still need someone to show you the ropes,” she said.

Other facets of Burnett’s role are observing and providing feedback to new teachers and working one-on-one with teachers who feel they are having difficulty in certain areas. New teachers are also encouraged to observe other educators in action; the district provides a substitute in this instance.

Continual, tailored growth

In addition to the mentoring program, La Crosse offers new teachers five support seminars, covering topics such as how to make the most of parent-teacher conferences and how to prepare students for the Wisconsin Knowledge and Concepts Exam (WKCE). To meet the needs of the “incoming class,” additional workshops and presentations are also offered.

A curriculum or literacy seminar for elementary teachers would – and should – look much different than one for high school-level teachers. So Burnett keeps tabs on who’s new and what their needs are, and regularly asks for feedback.

In La Crosse, Tyser said, “the components are there, but within each, we’re fine-tuning all the time. We want their time to be well-spent.”

With nearly 15 years of mentor program experience, administrators and teachers in La Crosse know the efforts – and time – spent cultivating relationships, sharing knowledge and supporting newcomers is, in fact, well spent.

“It is such a thrill to get out and see our new people,” Burnett said, “to see how they’re working, collaborating. The mentees, they learn so much. It more than snowballs, it blossoms. It’s wonderful to see the excitement, energy and new ideas. It’s a real boon for the profession that we can create and instill all this into the next generation.”

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PDP review team helps Initial Educators succeed

Another offering to Initial Educators in La Crosse is a PDP review team, a benefit not provided by many school districts.

Professional Development Plans, or PDPs, are required by PI 34 for all Initial Educators. A lengthy process that can span up to five years, PDPs must be reviewed by a team consisting of one teacher, one administrator and one representative of an institute of higher education. In other districts, Initial Educators have to seek out these people for their review team, but with all administrators and 24 teachers trained as reviewers in the School District of La Crosse, all the resources a new teacher would need are already at their fingertips.

“It enhances a teacher’s success,” said Sandy Brauer, the district’s director of curriculum and staff development. “It’s one less thing they have to worry about.”

The district has partnerships with the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse and Viterbo University for representatives from institutes of higher education. While not required, Initial Educators who do opt to utilize this in-district service are assigned to a team by human resources and the teacher’s association.

Rosemary Burnett, a 24-year teaching veteran who has served as the district’s mentor consultant since retiring in 2005, has also received training in the PDP process and is available to help.

Posted February 8, 2008