In trying times, can mentoring stem the tide of teacher turnover? 

Nothing could have prepared educators for the last two years: remote learning, frontline exposure to COVID-19, and pitched battles over masking. A relentless stream of stress and trauma, all playing out amid an uprising for racial justice and corresponding efforts to stifle the teaching of America’s history and legacy of racism. Teachers are understandably burned out, and they are leaving the field in unprecedented numbers.    

While the scale of the resulting teacher shortage is new, the problem of teacher turnover is endemic. Prior to COVID-19, almost half of all teachers left the profession within five years. Studies show that the resulting influx of novice teachers disproportionately impacts low-income students and students of color, exacerbating racial and socioeconomic disparities in academic performance.  

An effective solution to stem the rising tide of teacher turnover must simultaneously help new teachers get good, fast, and prioritize diversifying the educator workforce — a strategy shown to improve outcomes among all students, but among students of color especially.  

Evidence suggests that mentoring new teachers may help districts do both. But mentoring programs vary considerably. What components of mentoring programs are most effective at promoting retention? How can mentoring be leveraged to support new teachers of color in particular?   

A recent study by my team at Regional Education Laboratory-Northeast and Islands at Education Development Center examined Boston Public Schools’ New Teacher Development program and offered insights into both questions.   

Boston Public Schools has one of the most robust new teacher mentoring programs in Massachusetts. The district’s mandatory New Teacher Development program pairs every first-year teacher with an experienced mentor teacher. Veteran teachers receive a 5 percent differential of their base salary to provide new teachers with 10 hours of support per month. Throughout the school year, mentors participate in 25 hours of professional development on best mentoring and coaching practices.

What we learned:  

1. Time counts. The amount of time new teachers spent with their mentors mattered. Teachers who met at least an hour a week with their mentor were more likely to be retained than those who met less frequently, but two hours a week wasn’t better than one. Time is a scarce commodity in teachers’ schedules; one hour a week is a modest investment that could yield meaningful outcomes.  

2. Common topics should be tracked to provide targeted support. Our study found that the topics new teachers discussed with their mentors predicted whether they would stay in their jobs. New teachers who spent substantial time discussing classroom management or teaching evaluations with their mentors were less likely to stay in their jobs than those who did not. Tracking topic and retention patterns may help districts design early-warning indicators and targeted supports to identify and intervene in key areas associated with attrition.  

3. Pay attention to racial variation in new teachers’ experiences. New teachers of color had different experiences of the mentoring program than did white teachers. Black novice teachers were much less likely to report discussing classroom management with their mentors than white novice teachers and were much less likely to report that the program impacted their decision to stay in the district. Having a mentor of the same race didn’t increase the odds of retention for teachers of color, but white teachers with white mentors were retained at higher rates than white teachers with mentors of color. Identifying this racial variation is a necessary first step — next, administrators must investigate explanations for this divergence and design program improvements that improve equity and program impact.  

Boston Public Schools and our  team presented these findings directly to program participants to get their suggestions for reforms to the program. Participants’ valuable input served to spotlight key aspects of mentoring that districts should consider as they develop programs.   

Many told us that the biggest barrier to effective mentoring is poorly-aligned matches between mentors and new teachers. In Boston, building principals pair new teachers with mentors, so selection and pairing vary considerably across schools. Many new teachers were paired with mentors outside their grade or content area, compromising the effectiveness of the mentoring they received.   

In response, the district has sought ways to provide mentoring program leaders with more control over matching new teachers to mentors. The district and program leadership are working to adopt a more centralized program model, in which full-time mentor teachers will be carefully vetted and intentionally assigned to provide individual support to a small cohort of new teachers. These mentors will no longer have to balance mentoring against their classroom responsibilities but will work full-time to support new teachers in their first year.   

More work and research are needed to understand how mentoring can effectively support new teachers of color. Much has been done to improve the cultural responsiveness of students’ educational experiences, but how can new teacher development be made more culturally responsive? Moving forward, the district plans to continue to draw on data and teachers’ input to tailor the program to fit the needs of new teachers, and new teachers of color in particular, in urban schools.   

Boston Public Schools’ work has significant implications for all those who are working to fill teacher vacancies, accelerate novice educators’ learning and develop policy and practice to support and retain new educators, most especially new educators of color. Districts, municipal governments and state departments of education can learn from this recently completed study and BPS’ response to it, as well as from the voices of teachers whose experiences our research sought to understand.  

Beyond learning, education leaders and policymakers must invest financial and human capital in supporting the growth of early career educators. With strategic planning and action that includes mentoring and induction program administrators and participants, these investments will yield the most important returns: dedicated career educators who provide high-quality, culturally responsive instruction for students.

Meg Caven, Ph.D, is a senior research associate at the Education Development Center (EDC). Raifu Durodoye is a senior research associate at WestEd. Kaitlin Torossian is a new teacher developer at Boston Public Schools.