Learning to Become a More Effective
Research Mentor for Your Trainees:
Undergraduates to Post-Docs
Eric Hooper (today’s facilitator)
Robert Mathieu
Christine Pfund
Janet Branchaw
and many others…
Departments and Programs: Astronomy; Physics; Delta
Program in Research, Teaching, and Learning; Center for the
Integration of Research, Teaching, and Learning; Wisconsin
Program for Scientific Teaching; Center for Biology
Education; Wisconsin Center for Education Research
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Plan for this Afternoon
• Set the stage.
• Share your tales of mentoring, the good, the
bad, the ugly.
• Discuss a case study.
• Discuss another case study.
• Summary discussion and next step.
• Seminar evaluation.
Interactive book of the full mentoring seminar available:
researchmentortraining.org
Defining Mentoring
“dynamic reciprocal relationship
between an advanced career
imcumbent and a less experienced
professional (protégé) aimed at
promoting the development and
fulfillment of both” (Haley 1997)
Supports both the career and
psychosocial development of protégé
(Ehrich et al 2004)
Benefits of Mentoring Mindfully
• Students more successful.
• Recruitment and retention of students to your
department, program, or class.
• Less stress (an ounce of prevention…).
• Better funding proposals.
NSF and Mentoring Postdocs
• Part of broader impacts.
• Supplementary document.
• 1 page description for all collaborative
institutions.
• All postdocs on the proposal, regardless of
location.
• See NSF Grant Proposal Guide II.C.2.j (make
sure it’s the January 2010 version!):
www.nsf.gov/pubs/policydocs/pappguide/nsf10_1/gpg_2.jsp#IIC2j
What do Experienced Mentors Say?
•
•
•
•
Learned by making mistakes
Learned from experience
Learned from making mistakes
Learned from making mistakes
• …….and still learning from making mistakes
Can Mentoring be Taught?
• Can you teach someone to be a researcher?
• Can you teach someone to write?
• Can you teach someone to teach?
Each of these skills is a combination of passion,
intuition, experience, and knowledge.
The UW-Madison Mentoring Seminar
• Eight to nine-week (1 hour meeting per week)
seminar developed using an iterative approach
of design, testing, evaluation, and revision.
• Discussion, outside activities, readings.
• Currently optimized for mentoring researchers,
undergraduates and up, but has been ported to
other purposes.
• Originally used in biology, now being adapted
across science, technology, engineering, math,
and social sciences (NSF funded).
Seminar Topics:
•Establishing a good relationship
with your mentee
•Learning to Communicate
•Establishing Expectations
•Understanding
•Addressing & benefiting from
Diversity
•Ethics
•Independence
•Developing a Mentoring Philosophy
Multidisciplinary interactive book available at:
researchmentortraining.org
“Can I Run a Seminar Like This?”
• Yes you can.
• If I can do it, you can do it.
• People with a range of ages and professional
background have successfully facilitated
seminars.
• It helps to have experience as a mentee in your
setting.
• The primary goal is to facilitate rich discussions.
• We provide the materials (cases, guidelines,
questions, strategies) via a website.
• Helps if participants are actively mentoring.
Discuss your Mentoring Experiences
• As mentor, or mentee.
• Good or bad, or elements of each. Why? How did
you know?
• What and how did you or they learn about
mentoring? What can be generalized.
• Discuss from a variety of perspectives: mentor;
mentee; a colleague; supervisor of a mentor.
• Specific event or situation, or more general
impressions.
• What constitutes a good project for your mentee?
• Does everyone around you agree on the good, the
bad, and the ugly of the situation?
Understanding: It Seemed so Clear…
You recently explained a complicated computational
technique to your mentee. As you talked, he nodded
the entire time as if he understood every word you
said. Upon finishing, you asked him if he had any
questions. He said no. Just to make sure, you
asked him if everything was clear. He said yes.
Three days later you asked the mentee how the
work using this technique was going and he told you
he hasn’t started because he does not understand
the technique.
Independence: Too much Free Rein?
A student is excited about the new data she just obtained
from a recent observing run at a telescope. These are her
first data, and she wants to reduce and analyze them herself.
Her mentor respects her desire to do the work independently,
and so decides not to interfere unless asked. Four weeks go
by without a word from the student, and the mentor decides
to check in. The mentee says that everything is going fine,
and she'll have results to show the mentor shortly. A week
later she proudly asks to set up an appointment to show her
mentor the results. After only five minutes the mentor knows
that the student has not reduced the data correctly, and in
fact would have to do most of the work again. The mentor
points out the mistakes. As the student leaves it is clear that
she is crestfallen. After a week, the mentor hasn't heard a
word from her. The mentor wonders if the mentee was given
too much freedom and ponders what to do now.
2 Summers of Multi-discipline Seminars
Participation by Discipline
Participation within Physical
Sciences
80
70
30
60
25
50
20
40
30
15
20
10
10
5
0
Biological
Sciences
Physical
Sciences
Mathematics
Engineering
Other
0
Chemistry
Astrophysics
Participation by Position
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Graduate
Students
Post-docs
Faculty
Staff
Geology
Quotes from Astrophysics Participants
• “I genuinely enjoyed the discussions and felt that the
topics were very applicable to my mentoring experience.
They made me think about things I had not really thought
about before.”
• “The discussions were thought-provoking, interesting,
and most of the time had specific techniques or ideas to
implement in my own mentoring relationship.”
• “I think I will try to improve my communication with the
student, and give more feedback to the student about
how I feel he or she and the project are doing. I think I
will try to be more personable, and to get to know my
mentee a bit better.”
Changes in Behavior of the Mentors
100
% Mentors who Responded Positively
90
80
70
60
Untrained Mentors
Trained Mentors
50
40
30
20
10
0
Discussed
Oriented to
mentees'
your building
expectations
of you, as the
mentor
Considered
issues of
diversity in
regards to
mentoring
Pfund et al. Science 311, 473 (2006)
Discussed an
Reflected
aspect of
upon or wrote
mentoring with
your own
your colleague mentoring
philosophy
www.researchmentortraining.org
Wrap up Discussion
• What are your needs for mentor training?
• Did you find some elements you’d like to
implement?
• Items not included that you’d like to see?
• General thoughts?
Thank you!
• Please consider filling out the seminar
evaluation forms.
• Want to chat?
– I’m here through the end of the meeting.
– ehooper {at} astro.wisc.edu.
• That website again is
researchmentortraining.org
END