Mentor to a new governor: role

Understand your role as a mentor and how to support a new governor or trustee on your board.

Last reviewed on 26 October 2022
School types: AllSchool phases: AllRef: 32194
Contents
  1. Who should be a mentor
  2. The role
  3. Direct the new governor to our training
  4. Outline mentoring arrangements in your policy

Thanks to Fred Birkett, one of our associate education experts, who helped us with this article.

Who should be a mentor

As a mentor, you should be an experienced member of the governing board.

Mentors could be the chair/vice chair of the board or a committee chair, but they also need to have the capacity to carry out the role. 

It'll likely be the chair who organises mentoring, as it's the chair's responsibility to promote and facilitate the mentoring and support of your new governors. This is outlined on page 26 of the competency framework

The role

You should:

Discuss with the new governor how you want to keep in contact, such as