RAPPORT
Issue 5 (August 2020)
may be conflated (see for example
Andrews & Wallis 1999);
• the limited opportunities for training and
development in coaching and mentoring
approaches for staff;
• the provision of central support services
in areas such as academic
writing/academic skills development as
a discrete provider of coaching
(solutions)-related services centred
upon the improvement of academic
performance in particular; and:
• given the emphasis upon learning - to
the perceived relevance of specific
coaching relationships in contexts
where specific professional routeways
and ‘fitness to practice’ requirements
are not involved or – for mentoring - as
an element in contexts where
‘workplace mentors’ already exist (in
teacher or nurse education, for
example). 16
It is therefore not surprising that the
evidence in our overall Portfolio sample
group centred more upon engagement
with students via single interventions,
crisis situations and elements of student
referral to professional support services.
As testimony from one Portfolio
emphasises, their University:
… offers 3 different models which
allows for diversity across faculties
and even within departments ….
identifies three major strands of
pastoral support, academic advice
and careers/placement and allows
for a reactive approach to problems
and issues, via sign posting when
the students need professional
services. This unfortunately doesn’t
allow for a nurturing or coaching role,
therefore impacting on the ability to
develop collaborative and proactive
relationship with the students.
(Portfolio 23)
One final point remains, which the limited
sample on which this paper is based
cannot answer but which remains of
central importance; issues of ‘power’ and
‘control’ in such coaching and mentoring
relationships (see e.g. Garvey et al, op.
cit., chapter 7). From one perspective, the
practices of coaching (and mentoring) may
consciously and explicitly disrupt or shift
the dynamic away from the tutor as
‘problem solver’ toward an emphasis on
the student as the active agent in the
process, providing support and scaffolding
which enable tutees to develop different
ways of seeing the situation and/or new
ways of addressing issues and decision
taking. From another, notwithstanding the
focus upon dialogue and learner
ownership, the tutor remains in control of
the process (see e.g. Clutterbuck 1998: 8)
and the hierarchical power difference
between tutor and tutee is reinforced.
Indeed, one may speculate that – in
contexts where tutorial time is limited – an
emphasis upon a solutions-focused
approach may threaten to drive out the
relationship building elements, as the
quotation immediately above suggests.
But the wider applicability of that view,
alongside the recognition of the strengths
and limitations of coaching and mentoring
approaches in UK HE settings are
themselves questions for further
exploration.
16
This is clearly different from the discussion here
about coaching and mentoring within the
context of personal tutoring and student support
and guidance.
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