Abstract

The BA Social Work team are starting a student mentoring scheme across the three years of study from September 2022. This is building on a scheme which Dr Diane Simpson set up at another HEI and looks to reflect on and extend the learning from the scheme. Peer mentoring has been shown to be an effective way of supporting students to transition into higher education, whilst also offering benefits for mentors and HEIs. The round table presentation will provide an overview of the current evidence base for peer mentoring and outline the proposed scheme within the BA Social Work. Reflections from Simpson et al.’s (2022) research will also be discussed in relation to how the team will take forward this learning, and build on this, including research and evaluation of the process. Consideration of the transferability to other professional programmes within the faculty will also discussed.
The scheme is inherently student focused and relates to a number of the themes within this year’s conference, including but not limited to; ‘relationships to professional and academic identities’, ‘relationships with academic disciplines, knowledge, and skills’, ‘relationships with other aspects of higher education’ including belongingness, and ‘diversity and inclusion’. The reasons behind the introduction of the scheme include further development of skills within student social workers, developing stronger social work student identities and sense of ‘belongingness’, and supporting students who may find it difficult to transition into HE, especially on a professional programme which places a high level of demands on them.

References

Simpson, D., Pearson, B., Kelly, M., Mendum, I., Lockwood, A. and Fletcher, S. (2022) ‘Buddy up! Student mentoring in a social work undergraduate programme’, Social Work Education, DOI: 10.1080/02615479.2022.2057465