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The FEQ Guide Program
The FEQ Guide program pairs PhD students with First Experiences in Quantum (FEQ) undergraduates for hands-on research mentorship. Graduate students work closely with their FEQ mentee on a lab-based project, providing guidance and training while developing their own leadership and teaching skills. This arrangement benefits everyone involved: undergrads gain intensive research experience with a dedicated mentor, graduate students build their mentoring portfolio and potentially train future labmates, and faculty advisors expand their lab's capacity with minimal time investment while earning NSF Broader Impacts talking points. The program requires faculty advisor approval but is designed to be administratively lightweight, with grad students handling the mentoring relationship and faculty providing project oversight.
Why Become a FEQ Guide?
Mentoring an FEQ undergraduate builds your research group's capacity while developing your own skills. When you train your future labmate now, FEQ students who continue in your lab will already understand your experimental setup and protocols, leading to faster research progress down the line.
Serving as a FEQ Guide provides valuable leadership experience that strengthens your mentoring portfolio for academic job applications and NSF fellowship proposals. You'll develop teaching skills by practicing how to explain complex concepts, which is essential preparation whether you're heading toward faculty positions or industry roles requiring team leadership.
Undergrads often ask questions that reveal unexplored angles in your research, bringing fresh perspectives to your work. The time investment is modest, typically 2-4 hours per week during the program, with significant long-term payoff as students become increasingly independent.
Interested in Becoming a FEQ Guide?
We're looking for PhD students to mentor FEQ undergraduates in hands-on quantum research projects. Currently, 18 faculty members have pre-approved participation from their labs, but we'd like to expand the program's capacity to accommodate more students.
If your advisor is already a participating FEQ faculty member, you can sign up to enable students to coordinate directly with you and your advisor about available projects.
If your advisor is not yet on the participating faculty list, you're welcome to discuss with them about this opportunity. We recognize that many faculty may simply not be aware of the program or haven't had the chance to consider it yet. This is your chance to bring a valuable mentoring opportunity to their attention.
Here's how you might approach your advisor: Start by sharing the program benefits and explaining your interest in developing mentoring skills. Emphasize that their time commitment would be minimal, consisting only of approving a project scope and occasional check-ins. You can also mention that participation provides content for NSF Broader Impacts sections.
Important: Your advisor must approve your participation and sign off on the project before you can officially become a FEQ Guide. This is non-negotiable, as only faculty can confer course credits and authorize lab access for undergraduate researchers.
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