Benefits of E-mentoring

Abstract

E-mentoring generates significant benefits across three interconnected levels: mentees, mentors, and institutions. For mentees, particularly nontraditional online learners, e-mentoring provides flexible access to developmental support that shapes not only academic performance but also confidence, identity formation, and persistence through critical transitions. Benefits extend beyond skill acquisition to include expanded social capital, network building, and psychosocial support across the emotional, academic, career, and role-modeling domains. Mentors gain a renewed sense of purpose, develop skills, and deepen their engagement with the institutional mission. At the institutional level, well-designed e-mentoring programs demonstrate measurable impacts on retention, graduation rates, and equity outcomes, particularly for first-generation students, adult learners, and historically marginalized populations. The chapter synthesizes research showing that e-mentoring’s value lies not in replacing traditional mentoring benefits, but in making those benefits accessible to students who would otherwise remain disconnected from developmental relationships essential for college success and postgraduation well-being.