Management and Assessment of a Successful Peer Mentor Program for Increasing Freshmen Retention

Abstract

He received his B.S. in Mechanical Engineering Technology from LeTourneau in 1994 then proceeded to spend 16 years in industry focusing on machine and civil design as well as project management. In 2010 he began his teaching career at his alma mater to share his experiences with engineering and technology students. He is currently a co-PI on the schools NSF-STEP retention grant.

Work In Progress: Is Our Capstone Mentorship Model Working?

“…Multiple studies have identified faculty mentorship of capstone teams as an key element of capstone experience (6)(7)(8). Student peer to peer mentoring has also been shown to be effective with respect to freshman retention (9,10). This research explores what are effective ways to have student peer to peer mentoring in engineering senior capstone.…”

Making Meaning through Mentorship: A Student-Led Layered Peer Mentorship Program

“…There are a variety of mentorship programs at different institutions, created for engineering students, that have assorted but generally homogeneous intentions geared toward student success. Some of these programs focus on increasing undergraduate internships [3] or on understanding career options [4], while others aim to increase student success in first-year programs [5] and improve student retention [6,7,8,9,10]. All these categories have various levels of mentorship tailored to meet the primary needs of the respective program.…”