Lauren Forner (Deniliquin High School – @laurenforner)

Sarah Thorneycroft (UNE – @sthcrft)

Narelle Lemon (RMIT – @rellypops)

David Jones (USQ – @djplaner)

Liisa Uusimaki (CSU – @luusimaki)

There is considerable support in the literature for community-based networking in preservice teacher programs, and anecdotal evidence from preservice teachers engaged in this type of online community shows significant benefits in such engagement. However, preservice students tend not to engage in online communities for professional networking without encouragement and support. This has repercussions when teachers enter the profession upon the completion of university studies; many early career teachers feel under prepared, under supported, and overwhelmed, something which manifests itself in a high drop-out rate of early career teachers from the profession. In an effort to ease this pressure, future teachers must start building a professional learning network before they enter the profession, ideally whilst they are completing preservice training, in an authentic environment. The communities created in research projects outlined in the literature usually involve the creation of closed or purpose-built community that does not always reflect the reality of existing networks that develop organically, nor does it ensure the likelihood that students will retain or continue to build this network after the completion of said projects.

This project creates a support structure to encourage preservice teachers to engage in professional networking in existing online communities of practice. Our aim is to reduce the reliance on a single mentor teacher or lecturer (as in traditional F2F mentoring arrangements) by ensuring the students are exposed to a range of mentors in an online environment. The project will be run outside of the confines of any existing coursework units and will involve the use of mentors drawn from this network. Our ultimate aims are to establish a framework for teachers gaining credit for mentoring  under existing accreditation schemes such as that of the New South Wales Institute of Teachers, and to use the results of this project to build a case that such a program be a mandatory part of preservice teacher programs.