My primary goal as a mentor is for any motivated mentee with a sincere desire to gain authentic research experience can develop as a scientist with and eventually independent from my guidance. Yet my mentorship is not limited to the time students spend in lab. I believe that interactions with students in the classroom also provide opportunities for both short- and long-term mentoring relationships.
I have always gravitated towards hand-off advisors and mentors because that type of person is a good fit for my personality and learning style. However, in order to mentor a diversity of students in the lab, I use a more structured but flexible approach. I use a mentoring contract as a way to have new mentees reflect on their reasoning for joining the lab, what they would like to accomplish while in the lab, and what qualities they feel like a good mentor should have. This allows me to tailor my mentoring to individual mentees’ needs, and communicates to my mentees that I care about their future success.
While science is collaborative by nature, success in any scientific discipline requires people to be capable of working independently. In order to foster independence in research, I work to ensure mentees take ownership of their projects and the lab techniques they learn. For example:
Two mentors who were critical in helping me pursue research at the graduate level were in the classroom. They both approached me after they noticed I was putting in extra effort to the class, which completely changed my career trajectory. Many students are aware of research opportunities but hesitate to reach out to faculty for any number of reasons (e.g., already busy with a part-time job or other extracurriculars). In the classroom -- especially a class with a lab component -- the professor or TA is in a unique position to identify students who show interest or curiosity in science but haven’t given research a try. I had the opportunity to reach out to a number of students when teaching the lab portion of introductory biology at UW Madison. My goal is not to funnel students into research labs. Rather, I believe it’s important for me to acknowledge the students’ efforts (e.g., staying late without prompting after a dissection because the student wanted to dissect and observe the spinal cord/brain) and help them identify labs they may be interested in joining, give feedback on emails to faculty, and give tips for lab interviews. I also learn about the students as individuals and keep in touch once the semester is over. This allows me to write strong letters of support for students that decide to continue on in research, or decide to pursue careers in other fields, such as medicine, industry, or education. Finally, I believe that being proactive about these mentorships in the classroom strengthens the experiences and future applications of students who are not traditionally represented in scientific careers.
Ultimately, I am a proactive mentor when I first work with a student because I believe that setting a student's short- and long-term goals as the foundation of the mentor-mentee relationship allows me to adapt my mentoring strategy to a diverse range of people. My aim is to foster independence in my mentees but this need not happen in the same way or in the same time frame for each person. Outside my mentorship in the research lab, I expand my impact as a mentor by being proactive in helping classroom students map out and pursue career goals. To the extent I can, as someone who conducts research and teaches, I will catalyze a diversity of students in progressing towards STEM-related careers.