Beginning Educator Support

Support for First and Second Year Educators

The Beginning Educator Support Team (BEST) is one way novice educators in Renton are supported through comprehensive induction. The goal of the program is to support and retain beginning educators and ensure an equitable, high-quality education for every student in Renton.

Who we serve: 

Certificated educators in years 1 or 2 of  the profession (continuous, certificated teaching assignment in public, charter, or private schools in the United States).  Educators we serve include teachers, nurses, psychologists, occupational therapists, physical therapists, speech and language pathologists, audiologists, vision therapists, counselors, and librarians who work in school settings.

What do we do?

Induction is the complete package of support that brings novice educators into our District. Induction focuses on key areas including hiring, orientation, mentoring, professional learning, and formative assessment for teacher growth. Some of those supports include:

MENTORING: 

Beginning educators are paired with well trained mentors (experienced educators) who build learning-focused relationships with novice educators in order to facilitate maximum educator and student growth. 

STANDARDS FOR EFFECTIVE MENTORING 

• Cultivates learning-focused relationships with mentee through learning-focused conversations.

• Promotes mentee’s reflective practices in service of growth for educators and students.

• Focuses on own professional growth and reflection and adheres to professional ethics/codes of conduct.

• Builds mentee's knowledge and skills in curriculum, instruction, assessment and best practices.

• Connects mentee to multiple layers of organizational systems and facilitates mentee’s connections to various learning Communities.

• Fosters equitable thinking, practices, and outcomes. 

PROFESSIONAL LEARNING: We provide beginning educators opportunities to engage in intentional, coordinated, and sustained formal and informal job-embedded learning that promotes professional growth, reflection, collaboration, and equitable learning opportunities for students in their classrooms. 

FEEDBACK AND FORMATIVE ASSESSMENT FOR EDUCATOR GROWTH: Beginning educators receive regular, verbal and written formative feedback connected to the state’s evaluation system. Formative assessments and feedback seek to promote educator growth and development focused on student learning.