This is another example of the administration making a hasty decision and then backtracking. Mentors and teachers tried to tell them this back in the spring, but it was clear that they didn't understand what the program was about or what it meant to new teachers. Unfortunately, what was the Blum Mentoring Program will never be the same. The coordinator of the program and the experienced, well-trained mentors have been scattered to the winds. Some have retired, some have taken jobs outside the system and some have been placed in positions that are not utilizing their expertise. For the sake of the new teachers, I do hope that a viable mentoring program can be put into place, but with the loss of the people who made Blum so outstanding, I can't imagine how that will happen.

Getting rid of the Blum program was our CEO's worst move in a laundry list of things I don't agree with. My Blum mentor saved me time and time again, always offering advice for literally ANY situation or complication I was having. Without the Blum mentor program, I would have left Baltimore years ago... I hope the system realizes the error of its ways and keeps the Program running as it was for many years to come.

The heading, "Blum Mentoring is Back" is far from accurate here -- as Avalon says, Blum mentors are now scattered far and wide and no one with any familiarity with the program is probably available (or likely) to take the director's position at this late date. Even if someone was to take on this opportunity, (which, by the way, is wonderful of Ms. Feinblatt to provide) there are still many questions. For instance, who does this person actually direct? There are few in our cash-strapped schools who have the position of ONLY being a mentor -- most are mentors/staff develpers or mentors/instructional team leaders. In addition, what principal is going to allow one of his/her staff members to function autonomously under the direction of an off-site "director," when that principal's valuable dollars are being spent on that mentor? While I value the premise of Blum and I believe that it was an incredibly valuable program that should not have been eradicated, I'm doubtful that this skeleton program will do much to ameliorate the problems that Blum existed to address. In a completely site-based management system, it is difficult to see how a program like Blum, even if it had been left in-tact, would function. I do believe, however, that when Dr. Alonso realizes that good principals capable of managing an entirely site-based school will not simply materialize (many will fail and he'll have to get rid of them in order not to engage in the "dance of the lemons"), it is then that he will come back to Blum to help stabilize and improve the City's schools. Hopefully, then, if a skeleton has been kept in place, it will be easier to bring a new incarnation of the program to life.