Lessons Learned: Implementing A Large Scale Peer Mentoring Program

Beginning in 1992 with the creation of the Center for the Enhancement of Engineering Diversity (CEED), peer mentoring programs were established at Virginia Tech to assist in the high school to college transition of first-year students from underrepresented populations enrolled in the College of Engineering (CoE). Upper level students in the CoE who have successfully completed the transition process continue to serve as mentors, providing academic and social support to these new students as they adjust to the demands of the first-year engineering curriculum and their new social environment. These original mentoring programs, Academic Hispanic OutReach Alliance (AHORA), Black Engineering Support Teams (BEST), and Women in Engineering Support Teams (WEST) are instrumental in retaining students to the CoE. As reported in the January 2005 issue of the ASEE’s Prism, Virginia Tech was awarded a fiveyear $2 million NSF STEM Talent Expansion Program (STEP) Grant to increase its number of graduates in engineering and computer science. As part of the efforts to that end, the peer mentoring programs were expanded during the fall semester 2005 to include all interested firstyear students admitted to the CoE. Building on the success of the initial CEED programs, the projected increase was to serve 400 students with the creation of two new peer-mentoring programs, General Undergraduate Engineering Support Teams (GUEST) and Network for Engineering Transfer Students (NETS). With the implementation of GUEST and NETS, the number of first-year students participating as mentees increased from 126 in 2004 to 384 in 2005. In addition, the number of upper level students serving as mentors jumped from 32 in 2004 to 79 in 2005.This paper will outline the design and implementation of a large-scale peer mentoring program focusing mostly on the freshman programs of AHORA, BEST, GUEST and WEST. Lessons learned throughout implementation will be discussed as well as the first semester Grade Point Averages (GPAs) of first-year students participating in the program. This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant Number DUE – 0431646. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.