Student Mentor Training
*CURRENTLY UNDER DEVELOPMENT – LAUNCHING JUNE 2025!*
The resources below are intended to help you make the most of your time as a student mentor, helping you to build an effective partnership with your mentee and to develop your own professional skills.
It probably seems like a lot, but don’t worry – you can work through the sections at your own pace and decide which areas you would like to focus on.
NEW: MASTERING MENTORING SWAYS!
We’ve loaded our mentoring resources into a series of shiny new Sways, complete with reflective prompts, mini challenges, and interactive quizzes to test your understanding:
- Getting Started with the Fundamentals
- Building an Effective Partnership
- Skills Focus
These resources are best viewed on a PC or laptop.
Getting Started: the fundamentals of mentoring
In this section you’ll find more details about what it means to be a mentor, and how to lay down the foundations for a successful partnership.
Simply put, mentoring is a more experienced individual using their knowledge and experiences as a foundation to support the growth and development of someone less experienced.
While mentoring has elements in common with teaching and coaching, it is not directive – mentors don’t tell mentees what to do.
Mentors are supportive, ready to listen without being judgmental, and focused on providing positive, practical, and reassuring guidance. They must be ready to talk through problems in confidence and to explore options together.
Mentoring gives mentees the tools and confidence they need to move forwards at their own pace, in a direction of their choosing. At the same time, mentors benefit from skills development and personal growth through reflection.
Watch the video below to find out more about your key responsibilities in under four minutes:
As a mentor, you’ll need to reach out to your mentee to introduce yourself and establish the parameters of the relationship.
Be yourself in your introductory email – remember that a mentoring partnership should be friendly, and being genuine will help to put you both at ease. See our guidelines below and remember: personality > punctuation!
You should create your own introductory email in your own style, but you should include:
- Your name and confirmation you will be their mentor
- Some details about your studies at the University, your interests etc.
- How you expect the partnership to work (what you can offer support with and how you will communicate)
- Question(s) for your mentee to get the conversation started
- A positive sign-off
Feeling stuck? Take a look at these examples: Introductory email examples
Your mentee is not your friend, and that’s okay! Mentoring is a friendly relationship that is built on trust and mutual respect. It doesn’t matter whether or not you share the same personal interests, hobbies, achievements etc.
You will act as a role model for your mentee and should maintain professional separation and respect one another’s personal space. Remember: yours and your mentee’s personal time and space (including social media) remain your own!
As a mentor, it’s important that you clearly and proactively set expectations and establish how the relationship will work , and that you do this in a friendly manner:
- What kind of things can you help with?
- How will you communicate with one another (email, instant messaging, in person)?
- How frequently will you be in contact?
When establishing what you can help with, it’s essential you abide by Good Academic Practice guidelines. See the TGAP section below, and remember: you are not a tutor. You are a mentor, and that’s great!
Mentoring partnerships are conducted in confidence, meaning that you should not share details of your discussions with any other parties.
However, if you have concerns for your mentee’s wellbeing then you must contact Student Services (theasc@).
Sometimes your mentee might ask a question that you can’t answer, or perhaps you feel a little out of your depth. That’s absolutely fine!
A key part of mentoring is recognising when you can provide support and when you should recommend somebody else for your mentee to contact– this is ‘signposting’. You should ask yourself three questions to determine whether or not you should answer yourself or signpost your mentee to somebody else:
- Do I know the answer?
- Am I comfortable discussing and giving advice on this topic?
- Will my answer be complete, meaning the discussion would not benefit from more information or a different perspective?
Use the graphic below to determine whether or not you should signpost.
You can find more information about signposting and a number of contacts you may wish to share in our quick signposting guide:
As a mentor it’s natural you want to help your mentee however you can, but you must ensure you abide by Good Academic Practice regulations. Failure to do so could see you both penalised for Academic Misconduct, whether or not this was intentional.
All students are required to complete Training in Good Academic Practice (TGAP) when matriculating. You can refresh your knowledge by revisiting the TGAP Moodle course, or reviewing the guidelines and overview below:
In particular, pay attention to guidelines concerning ‘Aiding and Abetting’, where an individual knowingly or otherwise assists in academic misconduct:
Avoiding Academic Misconduct as a mentor
You are a mentor and not a tutor, and therefore you should not directly involve yourself in the specifics of your mentee’s academic activities. Under no circumstances should you share your own work with them. Instead, signpost them to their module tutor or co-ordinator who will be able to address their queries.
Remember: you can give advice about academic skills, such as time management, but should not advise on anything related to content. Skills: yes. Content: no.
Building an effective partnership
Explore how to develop a trusting and meaningful partnership to help you both fulfil your goals.
Creating an effective mentoring partnership means building trust.
This won’t happen automatically and may not happen quickly, but there are steps you can take to develop trust within your partnership:
- Be yourself – professional doesn’t mean without personality, so don’t be artificial
- Be reliable – be consistent and meet commitments, including punctuality
- Be honest – say if you don’t know, and give honest and constructive feedback
Scroll through the slides below to find out more:
Building trust with your mentee
Asking questions is an essential part of effective communication. Done correctly, it not only enables you to gain information, but also helps to build rapport.
It’s important to try to focus on asking open questions, those which can’t be answered simply with a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ or single fact. This gives your mentee room to share and to direct the flow of conversation.
Explore the slides below to learn about the benefits of open questions and common mistakes to avoid:
Sometimes you’ll want to give feedback to your mentee on their plans, ideas, or perhaps something they’ve done. While a mentor is not a teacher and should not give direct instructions, particularly not on specifics concerning academic work, you can still encourage them to reflect, explore options together, and make suggestions.
When you’re delivering feedback, think about sensitively balancing positives and negatives. It’s essential you highlight positives to acknowledge achievements and celebrate progress. Constructive negative feedback can be equally useful in identifying areas in which your mentee can improve, giving you the opportunity to discuss a path forwards together.
Try to create a feedback sandwich: start with a positive – constructively address the negative – conclude with a positive.
- Positive: “It’s great you managed to find so many relevant texts to support your argument…”
- Negative: “You actually had so much to read that you didn’t leave much time to write. I’ve experienced this myself, so now I make sure to set a date for starting to write well in advance of the deadline…”
- Positive: “You’ll certainly find that all of the reading you’ve done will be helpful for your future tutorials and assignments.”
As mentoring is all about empowering your mentee, follow up your feedback with an open question that encourages them to respond to the feedback and create plans for the future:
“Based on this experience, what do you think you’ll do differently when you start working on your next essay?”
Mentoring skills focus
Mentoring is an opportunity to enhance a number of professional skills and undertake personal growth. You can also use your time as a mentor as evidence you have the skills employers are looking for.
Questions?
Contact the Student Mentoring team at [email protected].