Mentoring

Mentoring in Research and Scholarly Activity

Introduction

In this module, you will explore the following aspects of mentoring:

  1. The role of a mentor
  2. The mentoring relationship
  3. Selecting a mentor
  4. Institutional and other resources for cultivating mentoring relationships

Introduction (cont.)

The module consists of:

Case Study

Click on the image below to read the case study.

The Role of a Mentor

In Greek mythology, Athena, goddess of wisdom, assumed the form of Ulysses’ friend Mentor to counsel and support Ulysses’ young son in his father’s absence. This narrative is the source of the term “mentor” to designate someone who serves as a close, trusted, and experienced counselor or guide. The essence of mentoring, from its ancient origins to the present, is imparting wisdom and offering trusted support to the inexperienced.

The Role of a Mentor (cont.)

The description of a mentor has been enriched and expanded since Homer’s time, and has particular dimensions and significance in academia.

Mentors assist and support students during their graduate education and beyond. They provide both the initial grounding and the ongoing support for students’ continued professional development throughout their careers.

Although there is no exact definition of mentorship or consensus across disciplines, serving as a close, trusted counselor and guide remains a mentor’s central role.

The Role of a Mentor (cont.)

Activities in which mentors engage to provide this support include:

The Role of a Mentor (cont.)

Academic advisors or research supervisors may also be mentors, and good advising relationships include elements of mentoring; however, there are important differences between the two:

The Role of a Mentor (cont.)

While formal advising centers on developing disciplinary and research expertise, mentoring has a broader scope: mentors serve as more general advisors, supporters, coaches, sponsors, and role models. Additional elements of mentoring may include:

The Role of a Mentor (cont.)

Because mentoring is complex and multi-dimensional, no one person is likely to play all these roles equally well. Thus, another important mentoring task is to help the student identify and cultivate other individuals who may serve as additional mentors, both within and beyond the institution.

Mentors play a key role in socializing

Socializing in this context refers to various activities that facilitate a student's entry into the profession ranging from prevailing standards of authorship and data sharing to professional contacts and career advice

students and helping them to build their own professional networks. One element of socialization is encouraging students to seek out other individuals who may support their professional development, whether as colleagues, collaborators, or additional mentors.


This aspect of mentorship is especially critical for students entering a new academic or disciplinary culture and for individuals who see few role models in their field with whom they can easily identify.

The Role of a Mentor (cont.)

Effective mentoring can be particularly important to women and others who are currently underrepresented in the STEM (science, technology, engineering, & mathematics) disciplines*.

In addition to the universal challenges experienced by all students striving for high academic and professional goals, women and other underrepresented groups may confront both overt discrimination based on their gender or identity, and much subtler implicit bias

Prejudice in favor of or against one thing, person, or group compared with another, usually in a way considered to be unfair.

.


*A recent “institutional transformation” grant to UNH recognizes and supports mentoring as a key strategy for strengthening participation in STEM.

The Role of a Mentor (cont.)

Many well-intentioned individuals - including both mentors, and students themselves – have unconscious biases that influence their personal and professional behavior and expectations. Open, honest discussions based on mutual trust and respect can help students and mentors recognize and address discrimination or biases that may impede the student’s professional development. Information and resources about implicit bias can be found at Project Implicit.

The Mentoring Relationship

A mentoring relationship is a close, individualized relationship that develops over time between a student and a faculty member or other senior colleague. Successful mentoring is rewarding for both the student and the mentor.

Successful mentoring relationships embody many elements, including

The Mentoring Relationship (cont.)

Additional elements of a productive mentoring relationship are:

Along with the rewards, mentoring poses a variety of challenges to the mentor, including:

The Mentoring Relationship (cont.)

Mentors must also strive to:

On a more personal level, mentors must have the ability to:

The Mentoring Relationship (cont.)

Outcomes of mentoring are not guaranteed. Even with the best of intentions on both sides, not all mentoring relationships are successful. Students may not follow advice; mentors may be unable to rise to the challenges of a particular mentoring relationship. There may be irreconcilable differences in style, personality, or expectations.

If either party feels that the mentoring relationship has become unproductive or unsustainable, it is important to engage in an honest discussion of how best to repair or wind down the relationship. Ideally, this will include helping the student to identify an alternative mentor.

The Mentoring Relationship (cont.)

Mentoring relationships are personally and professionally important, and by their nature involve individuals with very different levels of power. It is thus critical that mentors recognize and accept the ethical obligations of their role, which include (but are not limited to):

The Mentoring Relationship (cont.)

Ethical obligations of mentors (cont.):

The Mentoring Relationship (cont.)

A successful mentoring relationship can be beneficial for both mentors and mentees.

A strong mentoring relationship often has permanent, positive effects on a student’s career whereas mentors often gain new insights from their students. Further, the relationship may develop into a professional collaboration or friendship. Seeing their students succeed is deeply rewarding to mentors; so is watching their students become mentors in turn. An effective mentor not only guides students’ professional development, but inspires and teaches them to do likewise for their own future students or others to whom they can offer support and guidance.

Selecting a Mentor

Sometimes a student’s mentor and advisor are different people - or the student may have a formal advisor, but never develop a deep mentoring relationship with anyone. Some of the points in the following sections may thus apply to advisors regardless of whether they are also serving as mentors.

Students need to look for different attributes in a mentor depending upon factors such as their discipline, area of study and/or research, and personal preferences.

Mentoring is a relationship between two people. When selecting a mentor, it is important for students to know what they expect of a person they ask to serve in this complex role. There are many possible approaches to selecting a mentor.

Selecting a Mentor (cont.)

The choice of a mentor is ultimately up to the student. After getting as much information as possible, students need to determine whether this is a person by whom they want to be professionally trained, supervised, advised, and supported—that is, the person to be their mentor. An individual a student may identify as a potential mentor is generally not under any obligation to be a mentor; these arrangements are often informal and organic (that is, a mentoring relationship develops over a period time and the student does not make a formal request to the individual to be their mentor).

Rather than trying to find one perfect mentor, students should seek multiple mentors who can play complementary roles. By carefully selecting multiple mentors, students increase the likelihood that they will receive the assistance and support that they desire.

Selecting a Mentor (cont.)

Students may find a good mentor in a non-obvious place. They should consider the value of a mentor to whom they do not report or consider a mentor at a distance from their current setting. It is important for students to find someone who can be truly honest with them without competing concerns, e.g., allegiance to other colleagues.

Students need to remember that there is a possibility that, for whatever reason, the mentoring relationship may not work. If this happens, students should seek another mentor. Although mentoring is a mutually beneficial relationship, students’ needs must take precedence.

The Role of the Institution

If a student encounters severe difficulties with a mentor, there are institutional processes and recourse available to help. UNH students experiencing problems with a mentor are encouraged to contact their department graduate coordinator, the department chair, or the Dean of the Graduate School for assistance.

Institutions should provide both implicit and explicit support for mentoring within their graduate programs, including workshops or other opportunities that help faculty to learn how to become more effective mentors (see links on Resources tab).

The Role of the Institution (cont.)

Graduate programs should support flexible training models that allow successful mentoring to develop. These models include encouraging multiple mentors, such as a teaching mentor and a research mentor, and an additional mentor for international or minority students.

As well as cultivating internal mentoring relationships, institutions can also help direct students to mentoring opportunities offered by professional societies and other extra-institutional sources.

Because not all students establish mentoring relationships, alternative sources of support and guidance are available. At UNH, students can seek guidance through their graduate programs or departments, the Graduate School, or the Research Office. They may also wish to approach senior colleagues with whom they have interacted in classes or collaborative projects.

Review Scenario 1

Scenario: A student in the final year of his graduate program is looking forward to focusing exclusively on research and writing this year: he has a lot to do to finish the project, but is confident that with a concentrated effort he will be able to do so. He has done a lot of teaching over the past two years, but this year he expects to be funded as a research assistant. However, in late August he receives an email from the department chair saying that since the department is short of teaching assistants for the coming semester, the student has been assigned to teach several lab sections. The student will be paid for the teaching rather than receiving a research assistantship. The student is concerned that the heavy teaching load will make it impossible for him to finish his research and thesis by the spring; he is also angry that the promised research assistantship was withdrawn. He decides he needs some guidance on how to handle this situation, so asks his mentor to discuss it with him. What should the mentor do (check all that apply)?
Correct. However, another answer exists.
Correct. However, another answer exists.
Incorrect.
Incorrect.
Correct. However, another answer exists.
Correct. However, another answer exists.
You have selected all of the correct statements.

Review Scenario 2

Scenario: A faculty member and a student work in related areas, but are in different departments and have no formal affiliation (the faculty member is not the student’s advisor, nor serving on the student’s committee, and the student has a formally assigned mentor within the academic program). They run into one another from time to time and discuss their projects; the faculty member occasionally offers the student advice or suggestions about research, academic job searches, and so on, and the student once asked the faculty member to look over a draft of an application letter. At a recent professional meeting they both attended, the faculty member introduced the student to some other senior colleagues and encouraged them to attend the student’s talk. Is this a mentoring relationship (check one)?
Incorrect.
Incorrect.
Incorrect.
Correct.

Review Scenario 3 - Question 1 & 2

Scenario: Professor Tong is a leading scholar in the field with a well-earned international reputation. An undergraduate who has always admired Professor Tong’s scholarship would like to recruit the professor as a mentor, reasoning that Professor Tong’s expertise in the discipline and extensive professional network would be very helpful to the student’s career development. Which of the following statements are true?

1. The student should research the experiences of other people Professor Tong has mentored.

Correct.
Incorrect.

2. Professor Tong’s availability should be a key consideration for the student.

Incorrect.
Correct.

Review Scenario 3 - Question 3 & 4

Scenario: Professor Tong is a leading scholar in the field with a well-earned international reputation. An undergraduate who has always admired Professor Tong’s scholarship would like to recruit the professor as a mentor, reasoning that Professor Tong’s expertise in the discipline and extensive professional network would be very helpful to the student’s career development. Which of the following statements are true?

3. Professor Tong is unlikely to have the time, energy, interest, and/or desire to invest in a mentoring relationship with an undergraduate.

Incorrect.
Correct.

4. The student should be willing to do anything to get Professor Tong to be his mentor due to his international reputation.

Incorrect.
Correct.

Review Scenario 4

Scenario: A graduate student with a young child is having a difficult time balancing work and family responsibilities. The student’s advisor believes strongly that students’ primary commitment should be to their research, and that while it’s perfectly fine for someone to choose to focus on raising a family, doing so is not compatible with a successful academic career. Which of the following are ways a mentor might be helpful to a student in this situation (check all that apply)?
Correct. However, another answer exists.
Incorrect.
Incorrect.
Correct. However, another answer exists.
Incorrect.
Correct. However, another answer exists.
You have selected all of the correct statements.

Case Study Review

Click on the image below to review the case study that was presented at the beginning of this module.

Congratulations!

Once you have finished all of the review questions click ’Certify Completion’.

Certify Completion