Distributed mentoring As well as promoting collegiality with other mentors I would also point to the benefits of networking with a wider cross-section of practitioners within a college. The participation which trainees themselves engage in is in reality far more complex than that of their dyadic relationship with their mentor. I am not referring here merely to their relationships with learners, but with their circle of colleagues; some of these may, de facto, be functioning as additional mentors, so numerous are their interventions (both supportive and otherwise). This kind of consideration perhaps applies most strongly when we examine the position of full-time trainees, only attending an institution on a teaching practice placement basis. Such trainees very frequently report that they have received valuable guidance from teachers whose classes they have been covering, for example – and often (in the case of specialists such as those in art and design or the sciences) from technicians as well.