High teacher attrition rates adversely affect beginning special education teachers remaining on the job many of whom lack teaching experience. With high rates, replacements are needed, especially in the field of special education where new teachers leave at higher rates than general education teachers. The general problem is that limited information is available for special education mentoring policies and practices. The central research question was to explore the experiences of special education teachers' responses to official state and district mentoring policies and practices. A field study was conducted with 3 teachers. Six teachers were interviewed for the actual study. The Theory of Planned Behavior framework was selected to understand through lived experiences of new middle school special education teachers' formal mentoring policies and practices and how they impact their effectiveness. The research design was a hermeneutic phenomenological research method. A comparative contrast analysis was the data analysis process. Key findings were mentors should be assigned initially in special education and same grade level for new special education teachers. Official state and district policies and practices should be discussed and reviewed early with new teachers. Conclusions were state policy should require all teachers receive mentoring support during the first 2 years in the profession and state policy should address how mentors are assigned to beginning teachers, allow for manageable mentor caseloads, and encourage programs to provide release time for mentors. The findings may lead to implications to revisit and revise current formal induction programs for new teachers, especially special education teachers. Five appendices are included. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]