Suppose there could be a better way to begin teaching.....

The ASSIST website provides a framework for helping novices off to a strong start in their teaching career. This "strong start" involves an emphasis on school personnel working together to help a beginning teacher succeed. Within this model, we imagine beginning teachers deeply engaged in their work with the guidance of a mentor teacher

• learning together regarding critical problems of teaching practice;
• receiving coaching to develop greater skill and confidence;
• practicing professional habits of mind related to inquiry into practice, content, and student learning; and
• participating with other beginning teachers and their mentors in a larger community of professional learning.

Within this model the principal provides effective leadership for implementing a strong induction program in the school, understands the needs of beginning teachers and mentor teachers, and creates a school culture that supports collaborative professional learning.

As a result, every beginning teacher feels confident about meeting the challenges of the first years of teaching. Mentor teachers are renewed by their own learning and by their sense of making a contribution to other teachers and to the teaching profession. Principals are satisfied that beginning teachers are receiving effective support for transition to the teaching profession and that students of beginning teachers have strong opportunities for learning.

All these educators have tools and resources easily accessible for these purposes through ASSIST, which supports them in working together in a professional learning community where collaboration becomes the norm of effective educational practice.