The mentoring a new teacher must complete to keep their licence may come out of their own pocket

What happened

New Jersey requires every novice teacher to be mentored during their provisional year, and the district's mentor programme plan for 2026-27 sets the stipends: $550 for mentoring a teacher on the standard certification route and $1,000 for one on the alternate route, with a mentor limited to two provisional teachers at a time. The plan then states that if the state appropriates funds they pay for mentor compensation and training, and that if the state does not, the compensation is the novice teacher's own responsibility. The plan gives no count of how many novice teachers the district expects, and no document in the district's published set does.

Why it matters to families

A first-year teacher being asked to pay for their own required mentoring is a retention problem in a district that needs new teachers, and it is the kind of term that only ever surfaces in a plan document like this one.

The evidence

The plan states: 'If State funds are appropriated for the novice teacher mentoring program, they shall be used for compensation of mentor teachers and mentor training. If state funds are not appropriated, compensation is the sole responsibility of the novice teacher.'

The source