Peer Mentors and the College Experience

Indianapolis, IN

Many students enter into the college environment and do not know how to handle the social and academic situations they are encountering for the first time. This study examines how peer mentors in a university setting impact new students and how the mentoring relationship is related to the student's college experience. Previous research found that high quality peer mentoring improves feelings of connectedness, decreases perceived stress, and increases perceptions of scholastic competence. Further, when students struggled in these areas success was often limited and students were not able to succeed. Accordingly, I will examine an established peer mentor program at a small Midwestern university. I hypothesize that peer mentoring will be related to connectedness, stress, and scholastic competence. First year students receiving peer mentoring will complete measures that assess their relationship with their peer mentor, as well as measures of connectedness, stress, and scholastic competence. Data will be analyzed and results will be discussed.