Since 2004, in the Teacher Education at the University of Helsinki, the network of teaching practice partners are being constructed, a partnership based collaboration of the university, schools and kindergartens. This network has become an important part of teacher education for both educational and societal reasons. In Finnish context, where the student teachers gain experience in both university teacher training schools and in these teaching practice schools/kindergartens, the network guarantees a diversity of teaching practice experiences and therefore extensively prepares students to work as professionals (cf. Jyrhämä & Syrjäläinen 2011). In Finnish teacher education programs, teaching practice periods are considered advanced studies in both the Bachelor’s and Master’s degree programs (cf.  Jyrhämä, 2006). The network of teaching practice partners consist of 740 teachers from about 194 schools and kindergartens. The network serves several teacher education programs: primary school teacher education (TE), subject TE, kindergarten TE, special TE and adult TE. This means that the network must encompass schools and educational institutions from day-care centers to polytechnic institutions. Mostly mentoring teachers are needed from primary, secondary and upper secondary level education.

In systematizing the collaboration, school mentors have become very important partners in teacher education: they regularly receive student teachers and act as their mentors. These part-time university teachers implement the curriculum of teacher education as well as those in the university department.  All mentoring teachers have been educated to their task: they have attended a supervision course of 8 credit points.

The awareness of the ethical, practical as well as complex character of the teacher’s work has brought the collaboration between school and university to research on teaching, learning and education. The need to integrate teachers’ practical expertise into teacher education is acknowledged (Sutherland et al., 2005; Hodkinson et al., 1999). Three main objectives can be recognized in school-university partnership: to prepare prospective teachers, to enhance the professional growth of practicing teachers, and to encourage research related to educational practice (Sandholz, 2002; Stevens, 1999).

The idea behind the type of collaborative infrastructure between schools and universities is the creation of a new learning community. This has been one of the guiding principles when systematizing the network of teaching practice partners at the University of Helsinki. The consistent and goal-oriented education of mentors and the officially ratified contractual agreement between the University of Helsinki and the schools in the Helsinki metropolitan area are the first steps in “bridging the gap” between academic and professional knowing.

At the University of Helsinki the execution and planning of the network of teaching practice schools has taken place in multiple ways. The most important activities have been the supervision courses and teaching practice symposiums. Along with this, the most important supporting web-site material is the Practicum Handbook (Syrjäläinen, Jyrhämä & Haverinen, 2004).

The aim of this study was to find out mentoring teachers’ views and experiences of

1) the organisation of the network,

2) the mentoring practices and

3) the key challenges in mentoring, teaching and schooling.

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