We are primarily concerned with the first type of mentoring, Educational mentoring . Mentoring expands the notion of what education is and who educators are. In traditional schooling, there is one expert, the teacher, who serves as a purveyor of knowledge. Educational mentoring provides for multiple experts, and a changed relationship between learner and teacher. The student is able to experience a relationship in which a person who is not responsible for assesing her is actually concerned with her learning.
Mentors have two main roles, as experts and as role models.
Mentors can act as subject matter experts, able to discuss with authority subjects which are out of a teacher's area of expertise. In this they are able to expand the educational experience of the student. Mentors also provide valuable role models for youths. Many existing mentoring projects cite this as their rationale, and target economically disadvantged youths for mentoring. Even in mentoring designed primarily to help students with their schoolwork, a mentor provides a link to the working world.