The UNE Business School continues the successful Peer Mentor Program to further support both ON and OFF campus students in core, quantitative first year Business units. Small group Peer Mentor sessions are facilitated by trained, senior students who have knowledge of their discipline, interpersonal and communication skills. The sessions also facilitate students to become successful learners by developing a sense of student identity and belonging to the UNE Business School, as well as the wider UNE community.

Participation in the program by students is voluntary and flexible. Students are encouraged to engage with the Peer Mentor as someone who has experience in the unit but is still also a fellow-student, providing opportunities to have a less structured approach to discussion. Students who are ON-campus can attend sessions each week held within the Business School teaching & learning areas.  Students who are OFF-campus can participate online via Moodle using real-time synchronous discussion through Adobe Connect.

The Peer Mentor Program aims to establish an inclusive environment of peer based collaborative learning that is viewed as an efficient, stimulating and mainstream activity. It provides students with additional opportunities to acquire and establish critical academic and learning skills in this key first year, and so enhance deeper discipline content knowledge and understanding. It promotes access, participation, progress, attainment, and engagement with their studies and university experience. This is particularly relevant for students who are: new to areas of Business study, will benefit from additional assistance with core quantitative skills, may have experienced educational disadvantage, &/or are still developing the skill set and confidence associated with successful transition to university study in general, and Business disciplines in particular. These factors are acknowledged to contribute to students’ academic success and retention. The Program also provides professional development opportunities for the Peer Mentors, gaining valuable experience towards graduate employability.

The units in the Peer Mentor Program are for students across the UNE Business School courses: Bachelor of Business, Bachelor of Accounting, Bachelor of Economics, Bachelor of Agribusiness and Bachelor of Agricultural and Resource Economics.

In 2017, the units are:

• AFM101 Introduction to Financial Accounting
• AFM103 Introductory Finance
• AFM112 Introduction to Management Accounting
• ECON101 Introductory Microeconomics
• ECON102 Introductory Macroeconomics
• QM161 Business Statistics 1
• QM162 Introduction to Business Analytics

The Peer Mentor Program is coordinated each Trimester by the First Year Advisor (Business & Law) Nola Holmes, together with the relevant Unit Coordinators.