people and planet

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The survey also asked lower secondary school teachers
whether they were participating at a mentoring
programme at the time. About 13% said they had been
assigned a mentor; the rate increased to 25% among
those with fewer than five years of experience. Within
this latter group, the range varied from 6% in Chile and
9% in Italy to 52% in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. In
Mexico, the share of teachers assigned a mentor was 22%
in primary education, 17% in lower secondary education
and 13% in upper secondary education (OECD, 2014c).
The effectiveness of induction and mentoring
programmes depends on the quality of interaction
with mentors. It can be bolstered if teachers have been
exposed to classrooms in their initial education. As
part of the teacher module of the World Bank Systems
Approach for Better Education Results (SABER),
information was collected on formal policies related to
the incidence and duration of prior classroom experience
for primary school teachers in conjunction with
induction or mentoring programmes (Table 19.1).
Some patterns emerge. In Cambodia, teacher trainees are
required to have up to three months of prior classroom
experience, with no formal systems to facilitate the
transition of new teachers into schools. By contrast, teacher
trainees in Lebanon are required, among other, to do
at least one year of classroom teaching to get their
certification, and to take part in an induction programme
when joining a school (World Bank, 2016b).
Differences between induction and mentoring
programmes can make it hard to compare results. A study
of six countries in Eastern Europe and the Caucasus
found that only Azerbaijan had a formal induction
programme for new teachers, lasting one year. Yet, fewer
systematic support measures may exist at the school
level, as for example in Ukraine. Georgia introduced a pilot
teacher induction and mentoring programme in 2009/10,
as part of which mentors received training and a special
allowance, but called it off subsequently due to problems
in implementation (GHK, 2011; World Bank, 2016b).
Teachers in western Balkan countries tend to have an
extended probation period of up to one year under the
guidance of appointed mentors. In the Sarajevo canton
of Bosnia and Herzegovina, mentors receive an allowance
equal to 5% to 10% of their salary, but no training, and may
not come from the same institutions as their mentees,
which can reduce their contact hours (ICF GHK, 2013).
IN-SERVICE TRAINING
One of the proposed thematic indicators aims to explore
the availability of in-service training as a way to support
teachers. The indicator presents more challenges
than those on teacher qualifications, as continuous
professional development programmes are even more
diverse than pre-service programmes and less easy to
classify into clear categories.
As the information is not collected in a systematic and
comparable way from administrative data, the UIS does
not currently report on it. In any case, in-service training
is rarely delivered in a centralized way, with significant
variation even at the school level. It also depends
on institutional requirements and the willingness of
teachers to participate, as well as whatever obstacles
they face, such as cost, time and schedule conflicts. A
global approach to gathering data would have to solicit
information directly from a sample of teachers.
The 2013 TALIS provides good insights into the possibilities
and challenges posed by this indicator. Among lower
secondary school teachers in 34 countries and subregional
entities, about 88% reported participation in at least one
professional development activity in the 12 months prior
to the survey, with the lowest rates observed in Chile
(72%) and Slovakia (73%). Participation rates remained
constant on average across countries in the two TALIS
rounds, although they fell from 100% to 84% in Spain
and from 85% to 75% in Italy between 2008 and 2013.
Teachers sometimes paid for training themselves, but this
should be excluded from the indicator to capture the
degree of support teachers receive.
TABLE 19.1:
Support opportunities for new primary school teachers, selected countries, 2010–2014
Prior classroom experience needed
Less than
12 months
Côte d’Ivoire, Djibouti, Kenya, Mali, Russian
Federation (St Petersburg and Tomsk regions)
Induction, mentoring or student experience
programme opportunities
Classroom experience during initial teacher education
or participation in induction or mentoring programmes
Both classroom experience in initial teacher education
and through induction or mentoring programmes
3 months
or less
Cambodia,
Republic of Moldova
12 to 24
months
Bulgaria,
Serbia
More than
24 months
Guinea-Bissau, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Nigeria
(Anambra and Bauchi), Palestine, TFYR Macedonia
Benin, Guyana, Nigeria (Ekiti),
Uganda
Lebanon,
Tunisia
Source: World Bank (2016b).
2016 • GLOBAL EDUCATION MONITORING REPORT 335