The Pennsylvania State University Augmentative and Alternative Communication Mentor Project

Penn State AAC Mentor Project - Sharing the Knowledge of AAC Users

About This Site

Establishing a Mentor Project

Outcomes

Further Information

Conclusion

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Establishing a Mentor Project
Step 3: Recruit qualified people to serve as mentors and provide training

Back to Step 3.

Penn State's Experience: How did the Penn State AAC Mentor Project recruit and prepare mentors?

The Penn State AAC Mentor Project focused on three strategies to ensure that mentors were of the highest quality:

Recruitment of well-qualified people as potential mentors
Provision of comprehensive training in mentoring skills
Provision of ongoing support to mentors during the program.

Recruitment of mentors. There are a group of adults who use AAC across the United States who are competent communicators and who have successfully attained educational, vocational, social, and personal goals. This group has the potential to be excellent mentors to adolescents and young adults who also use AAC. In order to recruit these adults as potential mentors, the Penn State AAC Mentor Project team posted invitations to a listserv that is popular in the AAC community (ACOLUG, the Augmentative Communication On-Line Users Group).

Letters or private E-mails were also sent to consumers who were leaders in the AAC community and to rehabilitation professionals requesting nominations of adults who used AAC and had significant potential to be positive mentors. All potential mentors were asked to complete an application via E-mail and were interviewed to assess their potential as mentors.

Leadership training for mentors. Before they were paired with a protégé, mentors were also asked to complete an on-line leadership training course to develop their skills as a mentor. The goals of the Mentor Leadership Training course were:

To develop positive and effective interpersonal communication skills
To develop collaborative problem solving skills, and
To learn strategies to facilitate access to disability-related information and resources.

There were four different lessons. The first three lessons were each designed around one of the three main topics - communication skills, problem solving strategies, and accessing disability-related information and resources. The fourth lesson provided the mentors with the opportunity to "put it all together".

Lesson 1 – The LAF strategy. Lesson 1 focused on positive and effective interpersonal communication skills. These skills are critical if mentors are to develop an open and positive relationship with their protégés. The lesson taught mentors the LAF strategy. The letters of LAF stand for:

Listen to the protégé and communicate respect
Ask the protégé questions to find out more
Focus on what the protégé is saying.

Lesson 2 – The DO IT! strategy. The second lesson taught the mentors collaborative problem solving and goal setting skills. These skills were critical if mentors were to be prepared to support the protégés in solving problems and setting goals. In this lesson, mentors were taught not to simply tell protégés what to do, but rather to ask questions to help the protégés learn to solve problems and set goals themselves. Specifically, the mentors learned the DO IT! strategy for collaborative problem solving and goal setting. The letters in DO IT! stand for the following steps:

Describe the specific problem or goal and explain why this is a problem or a goal
Outline lots of different ways to solve the problem or meet the goal
Identify the consequences of each plan and choose the best plan
Take action
! Celebrate success when the problem is solved or the goal achieved

Lesson 3 – The ASK strategy. The third lesson taught mentors how to access disability-related information and resources. This strategy was important because often protégés have difficulty solving problems or achieving goals when they do not have relevant information or when they do not know about available resources. This lesson taught mentors the ASK strategy. ASK stands for:

Answer the protégé’s question yourself if you are sure that you know the correct answer and you are sure that your information is complete and current
Send the protégé to someone else who knows the correct answer (for example, the technical support staff at an assistive technology company, a counselor from the Office of Vocational Rehabilitation)
Know how to use the Internet to help the protégé find the correct answer.

Teaching the strategies.

Lesson 4 – Putting it all together. The last lesson in the series reviews all of the strategies and provides links to return to the other lessons if needed.

Ongoing support for mentors. In addition to the Mentor Leadership Training program, the Penn State AAC Mentor Project also provided support to the mentors through multiple channels during the course of the mentor program. Throughout the program, mentors were able to contact members of the AAC Mentor Project Team with questions or concerns either by e-mail or telephone. The project team regularly contacted mentors to check that everything was going well and to respond to any problems or concerns.

In addition, all of the mentors participated in a group listserv where they could share their experiences, discuss common problems, and offer advice and support to one another. Finally, the Penn State AAC Mentor Project Team tried to facilitate opportunities for mentors (and protégés) to get together at national or regional conferences or meetings so that mentors could get to know one another in person.

Continue to Step 4.

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