The Professional Science Master’s Biotechnology program at the University of Maryland University College implemented a novel online mentoring program that pairs masters’ students with mentors from the biotechnology industry. The program has grown from 19 mentor-mentee pairs in fall 2009 to 46 pairs in fall 2011. The student retention in the program is currently 80%. Data indicate that the students who continued participating after the first semester had completed more courses before joining the program than the students who dropped. The end-of semester questionnaires show general student satisfaction and provide specific examples of gains in the students’ ability to identify and pursue their career goals. The number of courses completed by the mentees was significantly higher than the number of courses completed by the comparison group, indicating a possible effect of their participation in the mentoring program. So far, more mentees graduated than the comparison group of non-participants, and in less overall time. As the program progresses, possible effects on students’ academic achievement and time-to-graduation will be reevaluated. The effectiveness of the mentoring program on improving the participants’ career prospects after graduation will also be examined.

The University of Maryland University College’s (UMUC) Department of Education developed a program to increase achievement of secondary school students and increase retention of Master of Arts in Teaching Program (MAT) pre-service teacher candidates entitled, “Professional Partnerships”. “Professional Partnerships” is a tiered system of support that promotes stakeholder success by providing online mentoring to pre-service teacher candidates from master mentor teachers. The master mentor teachers were provided with web conferencing workshops and online mentoring in the use of technology tools, The goals of the program are based upon the Redesign of Teacher Education and a research based framework that strengthens partnerships with local school districts to include: improvement of secondary student achievement, enhancement of instruction provided by teacher candidates and in-class teachers through the use of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) content as a tool for instruction, improvement, assessment, and communication within the global educational community