Tracing ideas about mentoring newly qualified teachers and the expectations of school leadership in policy documents

Abstract

ABSTRACT The practice of mentoring newly qualified teachers (NQT) has gained international attention in research over the past few decades, but little attention has been paid to ideas about mentoring NQT as they are presented in policy documents. Such ideas are important, as they represent what lies behind certain specific policy initiatives and measures. Consequently, this study aimed to provide insight into ideas about mentoring NQT, and to clarify expectations of school leadership regarding such issues conveyed in Norwegian policy documents. Discourse analysis inspired by theories on discursive institutionalism and governance was conducted on five policy papers. The documents were selected from a national educational level in Norway, where the emphasis on mentoring NQT has increased significantly over the past few decades. Three core ideas became visible through analysis: mentoring as a matter of institutionalization, of cultivating career-long collective learning and development, and of boundary work across institutions. Our analysis demonstrates how these ideas are made thinkable and calculable to practitioners and are expected to be used as instruments for practice, as well as how they can be institutionalized into practices of mentoring and, thus, practicable in the Norwegian context. The indicated expectations of school leadership are discussed.