Administrators'...New Teacher Mentorship Program Survey

The Administrators’…New Teacher Mentorship Program survey was designed to gain insight into how familiar principals in Saskatoon Public Schools are with the existing new teacher mentorship program. A Second purpose is to gage the level of importance principals place on such a program. Thirdly results of this survey should give an indication if the principals are familiar with what the research suggests as well as how they see their role influencing new teachers. Novice teachers look foremost to principals for guidance and direction on how they should perform in schools (Wood ,2005). I conducted a test pilot of the survey with 4 principals, two females and two males, all of whom had varying years of experience in the principalship.

Revising the Survey
I received some valuable feedback from all four principals that participated in the survey. Although the feedback didn’t suggested any fundamental problems with the survey itself the revision made the survey questions easier to understand and with the addition of a couple questions I was able to ensure that I was obtaining all the necessary information. Following are the specific changes that were made. Numbers are identified according to their placement in survey #2.

Question #1 & 2
I changed these two questions to statements. They flow better with the rest of the survey this way. I changed the value of number 1 to include “don’t know” as it fits better with the statement versus the question format.

Questions 5 & 6
I added these two questions to get a sense if there was an understanding that mentoring programs support all stakeholders’ learning and not just student learning.

Question #7
I reworded this question due to the fact that all 4 principals felt that it was wordy and confusing. After looking at it again I did agree and attempted to simplify the wording for clarity.

Questions 9 – 11
I reordered these 3 questions as they had common content but did not follow each other in the original survey. With the common theme running through them it makes categorized one after another to keep the survey succinct.

Questions 13 & 18
I agreed with the suggestion to change the numbers in the lists to letters. It may have posed some confusion for readers but the break in numbers and letters makes it easier to identify answers from the initial question or statement.

Question 15
After reading the answers to # 15 is was obvious I had worded the question in a way that was confusing to the reader. What I wanted to know was simply who selects the mentors.

Question 16
Again, I reworded this question using fewer and more concise wording.

Question 20 & 21
These were additions as suggested by one of the principals. He is unfamiliar, as am I, with whether or not there is such a procedure in place. It would make sense to both of us that there be some way to evaluate the usefulness of the program as it exists.

Question #22
This is also an addition to the original survey and I will be very excited to how principals answer this question. It is my personal belief that there should be. I know that there would be some degree of informal mentoring for all employees but if it is not done with purpose and intention can we get the results necessary.

I found the test pilot extremely useful. When I initially sent it out to my peers I was feeling confident that I had developed a valuable tool that needed little revision. I was wrong. Concise wording in the survey appeared to be the greatest weakness. Having professionals with some familiarity to the content complete and critique the survey helped bring it to life. Their comments and questions forced me to rethink the formatting, succinctness and clarity and lead to more valuable survey that I will use in the New Year.

You can view the surveys at the following links:
Survey #1
https://survey.usask.ca/survey.php?sid=18323
Survey #2
https://survey.usask.ca/survey.php?sid=18424

References
Wood, A. L. (2005). The importance of principals: Site administrators' roles in novice

teacher induction. American Secondary Education, 33(2), 39.