A Practical Guide to Developing PeerAssisted Study in HE Institutions

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A Practical Guide to Developing Peer-Assisted
Study in HE Institutions

• Steve Scott-Marshall, Senior Counsellor,
  University of Teesside
• Kathryn Shaw, Student Achievement Officer,
  University of Teesside

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Who we are

• Steve Scott-Marshall, Senior Counsellor
• Remit to build, establish and encourage
  peer-mentoring across the University
• Train peer-mentors (flexible packages for
  different schemes)
• Integrate peer-mentoring into Learning, Teaching
  and Assessment Strategy in University

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Who we are

• Kathryn Shaw, Student Achievement Officer
  Retention Support Officer in TBS
• Provide individual support for students
• Orientation Welcome Week Induction
• Monitor and support attendance of 1st Years
• Develop student peer support

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Objectives of the Personal Development and
Employability module (PDE)

• To identify personal skills, abilities, interests
  and motivations and relate these to career
  opportunities
• To develop skills shaped to employers needs to
  enhance employability
• To apply communication theory within a business
  context, to include communication of numbers and
  IT
• To allow students to develop their PDP through
  the module

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Key aspects of the surgeries

• Focus on assignments for the Personal Development
  and Employability (PDE) module
• Open-door drop-in sessions
• Mentor-led
• One-to-one and group discussions
• Students encouraged to share ideas
• Questioning process

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What do mentors do in the sessions?

• Mentors DO
• Encourage students to think about how to approach
  the task and what the question means
• Guide students on where to access information
• Relate to students from their own experience
• Mentors DO NOT
• Re-teach
• Give students the answers
• Criticise staff
• Answer queries beyond the remit of their role

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Essential attributes of the mentoring concept at
the University of Teesside

• A process form
• An active relationship
• A helping process
• A teaching-learning process
• Reflective practice
• A career and personal development process
• A formalised process
• A role constructed by or for a mentor
• A. Roberts (2000)

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Questions/comments so far?
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Training the mentors

• Initial induction
• What is mentoring?
• Introduction to learning theory
• Communication, referral and problem solving
  skills
• Introduction to UoT support services
• Mentor Manual and information folder
• Ongoing training
• How to facilitate study sessions not to
  re-teach!!
• Specific consideration of assessment tasks

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Example content (Task 1 SWOT Analysis)

• Mentors role to facilitate Task 1 with students,
  who were asked to
• Conduct a SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses,
  opportunities, threats), in relation to your
  current strengths, skills and qualities
• Present an action plan drawing from the SWOT
  analysis

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Evaluation (Task 1 SWOT Analysis)

• Programmes
• Number of students
• Business Management 28
• Public Relations 5
• Marketing 3
• International Business Studies 2
• Accounting and Finance 3
• Business Studies 3
• Not known 5
• Total attendance 49 students
• (24 full time, 25 part time)

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Evaluation (Task 1 SWOT Analysis)

• Of students who attended a surgery for Task 1
• 94 found the session useful (2 not useful,
  4 not sure)
• 91 said they would attend a surgery again (9
  were unsure)
• 93 said they would recommend the surgery to
  other students (7 were unsure)

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Evaluation (Task 2 Emotional Intelligence)

• A basic analysis of Task 2 results indicated
  that students who attended a peer-assisted
  surgery scored on average 5 higher than a random
  sample of non-attending students
• A positive indication of the benefits to
  student achievement (to be investigated further)

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EvaluationFeedback from mentees

• This kind of service should be done more often,
  it helps new students to get on with their first
  tasks and gives you confidence with the rest of
  your assignments
• It is very worthwhile to have a students
  perspective on how to tackle assignments

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Evaluation Feedback from mentors

• Did you gain anything from the surgery?
• relationships were developed with the students,
  also made me think about the task (SWOT analysis)
  for myself
• I felt useful, approachable and it helped
  develop my communication skills
• It made me happy to know that I was helping
  students and giving something back to the
  University!

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Discussion points 1

• What is the purpose of the peer mentoring
  programme?
• How will it be embedded in the school/faculty/univ
  ersity student experience?
• How can the students interests be placed at the
  heart of the mentoring experience?

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Discussion points 2

• How will mentors be selected? What skills do
  they need?
• What support and training is needed for mentors?
• Whats the incentive for the mentors?

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Please contact us

• Steve Scott-Marshall
• S.Scott-Marshall_at_tees.ac.uk
• Kathryn Shaw
• K.E.Shaw_at_tees.ac.uk

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Source materials

• Fullerton, H. (1999) Facets of Mentoring in
  Higher Education 1, Staff and Educational
  Development Association
• Colley, H. (2003) Mentoring for Social Inclusion
• Miller, A. (2002) Mentoring students and young
  people a handbook of effective practice
• www.admin.ox.ac.uk/shw/peers.shtml Oxford
  University peer mentoring scheme
• www.tcd.ie/Student_Counselling/peer_support_page1.
  php Trinity College Dublin peer mentoring scheme

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Source materials

• Anderson, E.M. Lucrasse Shannon, A. (1995)
  Toward a conceptualisation of Mentoring, in T.
  Kerry and A.S. Shelton Mayes (eds) Issues in
  Mentoring, London Routledge
• Howard, A. and England-Kennedy E., Transgressing
  Boundaries Through Learning Communities, Journal
  of Cooperative Education, 36 (1)
• Lundeberg, M. and Moch, S. (1995), Influence of
  Social Interaction on Cognition Connected
  Learning in Science, Journal of Higher Education,
  66 (3)