Governor’s Grant Expands Induction and Mentoring Support in Arizona

The Arizona K12 Center is proud to announce it will be expanding its Arizona New Teacher Support Program to an additional 15 school sites, thanks to a $2 million grant from the Office of Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs.

Negative Economic Impacts: Educational Disparities Grant Program, funded through the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), called for projects to address learning loss due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

The Arizona New Teacher Support Program (AZNTSP) both addresses learning loss and sets the stage for continued student growth. By integrating research-based induction and mentoring structures, AZNTSP focuses on quality and retention within the population most likely to leave the teaching profession: beginning teachers. As the most significant influence on a student’s learning, teachers must be a priority in efforts to address learning loss and sustain student learning long-term.

The program covers the salary and benefits of a full-release mentor and the ongoing training required to ensure each mentor is highly equipped to support beginning teachers. In addition to providing these full-release, highly trained mentors, AZNTSP also provides beginning teachers with free professional learning opportunities.

The Center was already set to support seven Arizona districts with AZNTSP this school year. Funding from the governor’s office of just over $2 million allows the Arizona K12 Center to expand the induction and mentoring program. The Center is confirming the 15 additional sites from those who applied to join the Arizona New Teacher Support Program this past spring but that the Center did not then have the financial capacity to support.

The Arizona K12 Center trains and supports the identified mentors at each site with comprehensive and ongoing standards-based training, using the New Teacher Center’s evidence-based new teacher induction model. This prepares mentors to support a new teacher’s growth through coaching, reflection, and inquiry. These teachers just entering their career will have an instructional mentor serving in a non-evaluative role in their classrooms for at least two hours a week while teaching and learning are happening.

The Arizona K12 Center has partnered with school and district sites to implement evidence-based induction and mentoring for new teachers since 2006. 

The Arizona K12 Center’s mentor training and beginning teacher support events are available to all Arizona teachers. These offerings this school year include Mentor Institute, Advanced Mentor Institute, the Arizona New Teacher Induction Network, and Mentor Forums. This year’s Beginning Teacher Series features four events with Marcia Tate on brain-based teaching, beginning with Worksheets Don’t Grow Dendrites on October 7.