The Mentor Relationship

Working with a mentor is a requirement for completing the RECP (Religious Education Credentialing Program). Mentors serve as constructive guides for RECP candidates. Regular conversations (approximately 10 times per year) with a mentor helps with:

• hearing thoughtful suggestions and feedback as you progress through the process; and
• accountability for steady progress to the stated completion timeframe.

Meetings

It is suggested that you and your mentor find a standard time to meet each month, agreeing in advance on times in the year when you might not meet (such as over the summer, or during busy start-up or holiday times in the church calendar). Because this is your credentialing process, you are expected to take the lead and demonstrate professional responsibility for these meetings. However you and your mentor come to your agreed-upon time to meet, it is important that you honor that time by showing up on time and/or notifying your mentor in a timely fashion if you will be unable to make the meetings. Such reliability reflects positively on you as a professional colleague in the field, whereas poor attendance at meetings has the potential to hurt your credentialing process. We trust these relationships to be affirming for both mentors and mentees and for the relationship to be honored.

• The PDPM (Professional Development Programs Manager) is a resource person for candidates to talk over any questions they have regarding the mentoring relationship.

Mentor/Mentee Status Checks

Twice a year (due February 1st and August 1st), the UUA’s Professional Development Program Manager (PDPM) sends to mentors and candidates a Mentor/Candidate Status Check In form. This offers mentors and candidates the chance to assess their relationship:

• To affirm it’s a helpful & productive one; or
• to engage any concerns about it; and
• to consider whether a change in the relationship might be advantageous

Winter Mentor/Candidate Status Check — MENTOR Form

Winter Mentor/Candidate Status Check — CANDIDATE Form

Summer Candidate Status Check

The Mentor status form is shared with LREDA Committee on Mentoring (LCOM). LCOM is a resource for Mentors to work thru any questions about and build supports for the mentoring relationship.

Maintaining Communication & Program Engagement

Should a candidate not take initiative and/or respond to communications from their mentor, however, the following process will be followed:

• Mentee does not communicate for 60+ days (observing there may be a two-month window when mentors & mentees do not meet): The mentor should contact the Professional Development Program Manager (PDPM) at the UUA to let them know they have not heard from their mentee for two or more months.
• PDPM contacts the Credentialing candidate, copying the mentor, inquiring about intent to continue with the program and stay in relationship with the mentor.
  • The candidate responds with information for consideration.
  • Should the candidate not respond to the PDPM for 30+ days, the PDPM will place the candidate into “Inactive Status,” freeing the mentor from this mentoring relationship and making them available to other candidates.
  • When in Inactive Status, the candidate does not have access to credentialing scholarship funds. The PDPM will notify candidates of this formal status change.
  • Should the candidate remain unresponsive to communication for an additional 30+ days, the PDPM will advise the RECC (Religious Education Credentialing Committee) at their next meeting. The RECC may decide to keep the candidate in Inactive Status or they may terminate the candidate from the credentialing program. In such an instance, the candidate will be formally notified of the RECC’s decision.

Mentor Engagement

If the Mentor cancels meetings twice consecutively or often reschedules meetings outside of proposed schedule, the Candidate is encouraged to contact the PDPM who then contacts the LCOM. The LCOM will check-in with the Mentor to ensure that the commitment to the mentee is still ongoing.