Administrators bear primary responsibility for evaluating the performance of beginning educators and determining their eligibility for ongoing employment, but this should not prevent them from being partners in supporting and encouraging beginning educator growth. The following action steps can be taken to support beginning educators:

🢦 Make regular observation and feedback of beginning educators a priority. Administrators have limited time and it can be difficult for them to regularly observe all the educators in a building. Placing emphasis on ensuring that beginning educators are receiving needed feedback regarding their performance will help secure their retention and over time the frequency of feedback can be decreased.

🢦 Establish a collaborative school culture where observation is not seen as punitive, but supportive. When observation occurs sporadically and is used primarily to inform summative year-end evaluations, educators develop a negative perception of administrator observation. Administrators must make a conscientious effort to cultivate a supportive culture when it comes to observation, including using observation for formative as well as summative purposes. Conveying the message that the goal is improvement, not perfection is essential to boosting the confidence and morale of beginning teachers.

🢦 Communicate regularly with mentors to solicit their perspectives on the growth of the new educator, while allowing the mentor to maintain confidentiality with the beginning educator. Mentors are an invaluable resource to administrators who cannot always provide the same kind of personalized guidance and support. Administrators should feel comfortable visiting with mentors regarding how they can support the development of the beginning educator but should also remember that a mentor’s role is strictly supportive and non-evaluative. While the combined perspective of mentors and administrators may help provide guidance tailored to the needs of beginning educators, administrators should respect the nature and confidentiality of the mentor/mentee relationship.

🢦 Provide opportunities for beginning teachers to observe their more experienced peers. Finding ways to periodically release beginning teachers from their own responsibilities in the classroom can provide opportunities for them to benefit from observing how their more experienced peers motivate students, establish classroom routines, and deal with classroom management concerns. Focus group conversations with beginning teachers from all over Utah, revealed that early career educators see opportunities to observe other teachers’ classrooms as having a significant positive impact on their instructional practice.