WSFA 12 News Montgomery, AL |Education Report: High Hopes Placed On Teacher Mentoring Program
"I was so naive, I didn't know how to be nervous."
Dr. Cindy Elsberry remembers that day all too well 31 years ago in Georgia. She entered the classroom fresh out of school yet in some ways she was still a student, no mentor to lean on.
"I didn't have the classroom management skills and I was dealing with a lot of unruly kids at an inner-city school," said Elsberry.
Elsberry admitted she even thought about quitting but ended up staying in education unlike so many of her contemporaries today.
"50% of all teachers will end up leaving the profession within the first 5 years," said Governor Bob Riley.
Now a potential solution. The governor and the Alabama Department of Education are touting a new mentoring program that starts this year for new teachers coming into the system for the very first time in grades K-12.
"This is a watershed moment for education in Alabama," said one educator at the news conference today in Montgomery.
Under the plan it'll be the school principal's responsibility to assign a mentor to work with the new teacher for the first two years.
"Substitute teachers will be involved, teachers will be sent to other schools," Elsberry said.
Autauga County school officials say retired principals often help out.
The plan calls for the mentor to be paid $1,000, the entire concept recommended by the governor's Commission on Quality Teaching.
"We believe this will dramatically change the relationship between the teacher and students," said Governor Riley.
New art teacher Evelyn Yarbrough hopes that will be the case because she begins her new teaching career at Capitol Heights in Montgomery next week. Yarbrough knows she'll have the first-day jitters and first-day questions.
"This will help me get some ideas on how to keep the kids energized and grow," said Yarbrough.
We take you back to Cindy Elsberry. She survived her first year in teaching in 1976. Now with mentors on the scene, Elsberry is convinced new teachers today will not only survive but thrive.
So far the tri-county area has hired nearly 360 new teachers. No figures available yet from around the state.
The 4-year colleges in the River Region say they do not take the new mentoring program as a slight that they could do a better job preparing teachers for the real world. Auburn University in Montgomery, for instance, says it even assigns a mentor whenever a new professor is hired.
