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Outcomes of the AAC Mentor Project
What were the outcomes of the Penn State Mentor Leadership Training program?
In addition to the positive outcomes of the mentoring program, there were also many positive outcomes from the AAC Mentor Leadership Training program.
The training program served to build greater leadership capacity within the community of people who use AAC. A group of 30 adults who used AAC completed the leadership training program, learning effective communication skills, collaborative problem solving and goal setting skills, and strategies to access disability-related information and resources.
The program was highly effective in teaching potential mentors to use positive interpersonal communication skills and collaborative problem solving and goal setting skills.
- 100% of the mentors successfully acquired the LAF and DO IT! strategies and demonstrated their effective use in the role-plays that were part of the training program.
- All of the mentors demonstrated some evidence of generalization of these strategies to use with their protégés during the weekly interactions that were part of the mentoring program.
- The web-based instruction was relatively efficient. The majority of the mentors reported that it took them less than 20 hours to complete all of the lessons. Some mentors required more time (approximately 20-30 hours).
The mentors were very satisfied with the AAC Mentor Leadership Training and felt that it had prepared them to better assume a mentoring role.
- 93% of the mentors reported high levels of satisfaction with the AAC Mentor Leadership Training program immediately after completing the training. One mentor indicated that he already knew the strategies that were targeted in the training and did not benefit personally from the program. However he indicated that he would recommend the program to others.
- After participating in the mentoring program with their protégés for a year, mentors were again asked about their satisfaction with the training program. 97% of the mentors reported that the training had prepared them to better serve as a mentor.
These results suggest the feasibility of using the WWW as a vehicle to provide effective self-paced instruction to people with disabilities who require AAC. Future research should explore other applications of this form of instruction.
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What were the outcomes of the Penn State AAC Mentor Project?
