EFFECT OF ACADEMIC MENTORING ON STUDENTS ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE

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EFFECT OF ACADEMIC MENTORING ON STUDENTS ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background to the study

The word ‘mentorship’ is a deliberate pairing of a more skilled or experienced person with a lesser skilled or experienced one, with the agreed-upon goal of having the lesser skilled person grow and develop specific competencies. This definition allows for the possibility that a mentor may be younger than a mentee. Fairbanks, Freedman and Kahn (2000) define mentoring in teacher education as complex social interactions that mentor teachers and student teachers’ construct and negotiate for a variety of professional purposes and in response to the contextual factors they encounter. Mentorship has a long tradition in higher education.

Greyling and Rodes in Ojokuku and Sajuyigbe (2015) publication on “impact of mentoring on academic development of academics in Nigerian Universities”stated that in the traditional academic model, a mentor with noted performance in a discipline may seek out younger colleagues or students to nurture. He may encourage them to undertake particular research, write part of an article or contribution to a book, or become research assistants or associates on a large project. During this process, the younger academic learns skills in research and writing, gains opportunities to attend conferences and meetings and acquires information about resources and source of research finance. In addition, the younger academics (mentees) learn to understand and ‘decode’ the corporate culture.

Lang and Ford (2013), explain that mentorship is a ﬂexible approach to youth development in which student often identiﬁed as being “at-risk” for poor outcomes (e.g., low income, living in single-parent homes) are paired with unrelated adult volunteers in the hope that a nurturing and

encouraging relationship will cultivate that serves to alleviate these risk conditions. Mentorship is being effectively delivered in a variety of settings (e.g., in communities, schools) with youth and has shown to promote gains in emotional, behavioral, and academic outcomes, including among higher risk youth (Silverthorn, & Valentine, 2011).

The extent of the beneﬁts of mentorship, however, is moderate and remains virtually unaffected over the last decade even as the understanding of the determinants of higher quality mentoring relationships has drastically increased ( Dubois, Portillo, Rhodes, Silverthorn,& Valentine,2011; Rhodes & DuBois,2006).

In the United States, mentorship has been traced to the late 1800s to a program known as Friendly Visiting. Guetzloe (1997) opines that the program was established to match middle-class adults with poor children and youths to provide them with role models.

Wood (2012) cited that school-based mentorship is often administered by established mentorship charities that recruit and screen community volunteers, pairing them with youth. In 1904, the Men’s Club of the Central Presbyterian Church of New York emerged. They recognized the need to help youth in their community and started what is now known as Big Brothers/Big Sisters of America (BBBSA) organization. Traditionally, BBBSA has been a community-based mentoring program where adults are matched with youths of the same gender, on a one-on-one basis. As it is now, BBBSA is still recognized as one of the largest and longest running mentoring organizations in America, with nearly 500 agencies serving millions of children across all 50 states (Cutshall, 2001). This organization has continued to be a model for other community youth mentoring programs.

Mentorship can be seen as an intentional process and nurturing process that focuses on the development of the protégé or mentee towards his or her full potential. Mentoring can as well be seen as an insightful process in which the wisdom and expertise of a mentor is acquired and also applied by the mentee. Mentors lead students and youths along the journey of their lives; they cast light on the way ahead; interpret arcane signs; warn them of lurking dangers and point out unexpected delights along their ways, in order to become great achievers and performers in their society.

According to Stephen and Gareth (1999), mentorship is a process where one person offers help, guidance, advice and support to facilitate the learning or development of another person. Loeser (2008) opines that mentoring is a situation arranged by a community, organization, business or schools where two individuals agree to meet one-on-one on a regular basis. It involves pairing of a younger person (Mentee or Protégé) with an older and more experienced person (Mentor) with the expectation and belief that the dyad will develop and grow into a relationship where the mentor supports, guides, helps and assists the mentee (Thomson & Zand, 2010).

In mentorship, the protégé, develops and learns from the experienced mentors who through conversation sessions share knowledge and skills that can be incorporated into his or her thinking and practice. Some mentors are volunteers who engage in mentoring sessions simply because they have the urge, zeal and desire to help others who need it.

In some other cases, mentors are motivated to serve others just to receive compensation in exchange for the services provided by them. In both instances, mentoring is very necessary and important for some people to learn, grow, develop and improve personally, academically and professionally. Smith (1998) summed it up by asserting that the mentor’s role involves providing encouragement and support; helping to build self-confidence; challenging negative attitudes; and offering constructive feedback.

Other school-based programs may be organized by schools or by social workers. School-based mentoring accounts for a large part of new mentoring schemes and may have distinct advantages and benefits over other community-based programs. By comparison, organization and procedures may be simplified; some meetings can take place on school grounds, which is believed to be a safer environment. Teachers may strategically select youth who are likely to benefit from mentorship, and teachers can check that meetings occur and the program’s objectives are being accomplished along with the needs of the mentees. Mentors may be experienced teachers or older adolescents serving as mentors to youth in the same school. Adolescence is characterized by increased significance of peer relationships, and several studies identify harmful effects of ‘‘deviant’’ peer relationships that undermine pro-social behavior at school and in communities. Strong mentor relationships with adults or older students may replace or negate negative influences.

Joshua Morgan (2016) agrees that, mentoring is one of those things that just keep paying dividends. In addition to the emotional rewards of helping fellow scientists achieve, surrounding yourself with capable scientists enables good academic learning. Therefore, it is critical for mentors to train scientists proactively in how to do good academic learning from the start. Hund, Churchill and Faist (2018), survey data clearly indicate that while scientists think mentorship is important and want more formalized mentorship training, there is not currently a broadly implemented framework for mentorship training in academic learning fields. The first step in implementing such training is to define effective mentorship. The survey indicates that people use words like “patience,” “honesty,” “communication,” “empathy,” and “listening” as characteristics of good mentors. They take these impressions further by examining the primary literature to develop a definition of effective mentorship appropriate to the academic setting.

Defining effective mentorship is challenging in part because of the many different roles that the primary mentor (typically the “academic advisor”) must assume for undergraduates, graduate students, and postdocs (Jackson, Palepu, Szalacha, Caswell, Carr, & Inui, 2003; Jacobi, 1991; Mertz, 2004). The tasks of the mentor fall into several categories. First, they provide direction, set standards for work in their field, and help mentees develop and troubleshoot their research projects (Vilkinas,2008). Second, the advisor is the principal gateway for mentees into their departmental and discipline communities, and therefore needs to advocate for mentees and help them establish connections with other colleagues (Bair, Grant Haworth, & Sandfort, 2004; Barnes & Austin, 2009; Krauss & Yasukawa, 2013; Lovitts, 2001; Lyons, 1990). Third, the advisor must identify when students are struggling and help them find solutions (Barnes, Williams, & Stassen, 2012; O’Meara & Braskamp, 2005). Finally, mentor must manage and mediate conflicts between members of their laboratory groups and between themselves and mentees. The best mentor strive to model excellent scholarship and provide sponsorship, collaboration, and encouragement to build student skills and confidence (Barnes,Williams, & Archer, 2010; Meara, Knudsen, & Jones, 2013).

Finally, the process of mentoring can be viewed under three models, namely: the apprentice, competency and reflective models. In the apprentice model, the protégé will observe the mentor and learn from him or her. Competency model involves the mentor giving the mentee/protégé systematic feedback about his or her performance and progress. While, in the reflective model, the mentor helps and assists the mentee/protégé become a reflective practitioner. In the reflective model, mentoring is seen as an intentional, nurturing and insightful process that provides an effective and powerful growth experience for both the mentor and the mentee.

Despite the recognition of mentoring as an important component of the academic development of academics, however, there is not much empirical support to lend credence to the existence of effective mentoring relationship in higher institutions of learning. According to Okurame (2008), the pursuit of development by young scholars in the Nigeria academic terrain is not without challenges, fears and anxieties, and the recommended panacea for this is mentoring, it’s regarded as one of the best tools for reducing stress for young scientists, enhancing orientation to curriculum and promoting the creation of better norms of collegiality and collaboration.

Another area of challenge to effective mentoring activities in higher educational institutions in developing countries like Nigeria, as identified by Agunloye (2013), is that most of these institutions have large population of students and the Faculties have limited resources to provide individualized professional development training in the three essential domains of teaching, research and community service. The consequence of this, particularly for young academics, is that academic growth prospect becomes diminished, leading to feelings of discontentment, low morale, frustration and, of course, attrition.

1.2 Statement of the problem

A critical issue that becomes a focus in the recent development is the issue of the ability of the regular classroom lessons to meet the learning requirement of students who are always passive during academic learning subjects’ lessons due to the fear attached or developed in learning academic learning.

Olu-Ajayi(2013), affirm that the aim of academic learning in a nation is to maximize benefits derivable from academic learning towards her technology development. The problem of how to cope with the high national expectations from academic learning discipline has been to evolve and fashion out instructional strategies that will enable academic learning educators to achieve the high societal expectations. Different methods of teaching have been used to disseminate academic learning knowledge from the onset of formal education in Nigeria but there have always been a drift of students from the academic learnings to other disciplines which is as a result of mass failure in academic learnings which is termed “difficult to understand” thus creating a negative attitude leading to lack of interest and commitment to academic learning subjects. This may, according to Olu-Ajayi (2013) be due to inadequacies in the teaching strategies used to disseminate academic learning knowledge to these students. Adebayo (2000) suggested the teaching method of instruction as a main factor affecting students learning outcome. Since academic learning is activity filled, and interactive demanding, it is thought that complimenting the age long lecture method with modern teaching strategies like mentorship as discovered by Olu-Ajayi (2013) could improve students’ attitude towards academic learning

learning, as importance of academic learning in national development cannot be over emphasized. The research Olu-Ajayi (2013), believed the development of a mentoring relationship between teacher/student to reinforce the students’ confidence in his ability to learn as it reduces the teacher-student barrier.

Many research works have been made on academic mentorship and students’ academic performance. Dawn and Palmer (2009) as cited in Sylvia and Wilfred (2010) affirm that in today’s knowledge economy, the status quo has changed, and higher educational institutions are making mentorship more comprehensive and reachable by introducing formal mentoring programmes. According to the authors, this makes it possible for aspiring academia to receive mentorship support from a number of different people within the institution. The organization benefits with more employees successfully completing their probationary periods. The formal mentorship programme creates enthusiasm, professionalism and impacts positively the entire culture of the organization, promoting organizational values, norms, and standards (Williams, 2000).

For effective performance of the young ones in the world of academic learning, there is need for both formal and informal academic mentorship program in academic learning education. Klasen and Clutterbuck (2002) also find that mentorship encourages continuous self-managed learning, inspires employees to consistently improve their performance, and is more cost –effective than sending staff on formal and short-term courses. However, the troubles encountered in learning academic learning and the failures experienced by the individuals have brought about the pursuit of finding a new and an effective solution.

Nihal and Sertel (2011), explain that subject to a large number of researches (Luna, Prieto, 2009; Maxwell, 2009; Carter, 2008; Johnson,2008; Hughes and Dykstra, 2008; Karcher, 2008; Morales, 2007; Allen, Eby, Lentz, 2006; White, 2006; Simmons,2006; Wolfe, 2006; Bernier, Larose, Soucy, 2005; Karcher, 2005; Karcher, Davis, Powell, 2002; Beyene, Anglin, Sanchez and Ballou,2002) and many discussions in the recent years, mentorship is considered to have an important role in the performances of students and its often applied at schools to improve academic performance.

There are divergent views on the relationship between mentorship and academic advancement, some found positive relationship and some found no relationship. These inconsistencies in results are the justification for the present study. Within this context, the study sought to find the relationship in academic mentorship in academic learning and students’ academic performance.

1.3 Purpose of the study

The purpose of the study is to investigate academic mentorship in academic at senior secondary school level and how it affect students’ academic performance in selected secondary schools in Oyun local government area of Kwara state. The study aims to add to the body of research on mentorship programs.

1.4 Research Questions

Is there a need for academic mentorship in academic?
Does academic mentorship in academic have influence on students’ academic performance?
What is the effect of mentorship on individual’s academic development?

1.5 Null Hypotheses

Hence, the following research hypotheses were formulated and tested at 0.05 level of significance.

H₀₁ There is no significant difference between academic mentorship in academic and students’ academic performance.

H₀₂ There is no significant difference in the influence of academic mentorship and students’ academic performance.

H₀₃ There is no significant difference on the effect of academic mentorship on individual’s academic development.

1.6 Significance

This study was significant in that it contributed suggestions for development or enhancement framework that addresses mentoring of student that have desires in pursuing academic subjects. More so, valuable information will be made available for government and educational practitioners to help them come up with the best policies that could allow them to develop and designs an effective mentoring program that will better meet the needs of the students. In addition, results from this study could assist mentors in the school-based mentoring process to understand the most effective methods to perform their mentoring tasks.

1.7 Scope of the Study

The scope of the research covered some selected secondary schools in oyun local government area of kwara state. Furthermore, selected senior secondary students in year three (3) who have been engaged in informal mentoring relationship from year 1 to 3 were selected as respondent because the longer the mentor/mentee relationship, the greater the possibility of positive outcomes becomes. Finally, informal mentoring was utilized because it is the fastest growing type of mentoring today.

1.8 Definition of Terms

The following definition of terms is provided in order to clear any ambiguity with regard to concepts which will be described in subsequent chapters. The independent and dependent variables are operationally defined, and definitions are provided for other important and frequently used terms.

Mentorship/ mentoring: Collaborative learning relationshipsthat proceeds through purposeful stages over time and has the primary goal of helping mentees acquire the essential competencies needed for success in their chosen academic.

Mentor: An experienced person that guide another through an experience that requires personal and intellectual growth and development.

Mentee: a student or in-experienced person .

Academic learning: This is an applied knowledge that is important to individuals and the nation as a whole, to survive and meet the global economic requirements.

Academic: A academic is a series of jobs an individual holds during one’s work life (Feldman, 1996).

Academic performance: Academic performance is the extent to which a student, teacher or institution has achieved their short or long-term educational goals.

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