Graduate Division Enhanced Mentoring Support Initiative Justification and Need

Justification and need for enhanced mentoring practices for graduate students: Graduate Division Enhanced Mentoring Support Initiative

Enhanced student mentoring practices and programming, including in support of first-generation, BIPOC, and otherwise minoritized students, are expected to be among the most effective means to increase the retention, graduation, and success of graduate students. Many outstanding mentoring programs and practices are already in place at UCSC, but they may not be universally available across the campus. Enhanced graduate student success at UCSC depends in part on sustained holistic mentoring for our students in ways and levels appropriate for the discipline; providing this will require that the faculty and staff workload necessary to provide enhanced mentoring, which for BIPOC students is currently disproportionately provided by BIPOC faculty and staff, be appropriately recognized and rewarded.

Graduate students who experience positive mentoring relationships are more likely to persist in their academic pathways (McGee and Keller, 2007; Williams et al., 2016), and positive mentorship is cited as the most important factor in completing one’s degree (Ashtiani and Feliciano, 2012; Solorzano and Yosso, 2000) (NASEM 2019). Effective mentoring has disproportionately positive impacts on the outcomes of mentees from minoritized groups, as it is linked to increasing sense of belonging in an academic community and stronger persistence through related career paths (NASEM 2019; Anderson and Kim, 2006; Byars-Winston et al., 2015; Estrada et al., 2018; Felder, 2010; Griffith, 2010; Lewis et al., 2016; Hathaway et al., 2002; Thiry and Laursen, 2011).

Such research affirms the need to share tools, resources, and practices for effective and evidence-based mentorship in order to support both mentors and mentees, especially those from minoritized groups. In fact, assuming that supportive and effective mentorship relationships will occur without structures of support tends to advantage both mentors and mentees from socially dominant groups (NASEM 2019). The recommendations for successful mentoring practices provided here are drawn from research tied to successful outcomes of first-generation, BIPOC, and otherwise minoritized students, as well as from examples taken from our own campus, and are generally applicable to all graduate students.

Citations:

Anderson, Eugene L. and Dongbin Kim. “Increasing the Success of Minority Students in Science and Technology.” American Council on Education, 2006. Link

Ashtiani, Mariam and Cynthia Feliciano. “Mentorship and the postsecondary educational attainment of low-income youth.” Pathways to Postsecondary Success research brief, no. 5, September 2012. Los Angeles: All Campus Consortium On Research for Diversity (UC/ACCORD), 2012. Link

Byars-Winston, Angela M et al. “Culturally Diverse Undergraduate Researchers’ Academic Outcomes and Perceptions of Their Research Mentoring Relationships.” International journal of science education vol. 37,15 (2015): 2533-2554. doi:10.1080/09500693.2015.1085133 Link

Estrada, Mica, et al. “A longitudinal study of how quality mentorship and research experience integrate underrepresented minorities into stem careers.” CBE—Life Sciences Education, vol. 17, no. 1, Mar. 2018, https://doi.org/10.1187/cbe.17-04-0066. Link

Felder, Pamela. “On doctoral student development: Exploring faculty mentoring in the shaping of African American Doctoral Student Success.” The Qualitative Report, 19 Nov. 2014, https://doi.org/10.46743/2160-3715/2010.1160. Link

Griffith, Amanda L. “Persistence of women and minorities in STEM field majors: Is it the school that matters?” Economics of Education Review, vol. 29, no. 6, Dec. 2010. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.econedurev.2010.06.010. Link

Lewis, Molly L., and Michael C. Frank. “Understanding the effect of social context on learning: A replication of Xu and Tenenbaum (2007b).” Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, vol. 145, no. 9, Sept. 2016, https://doi.org/10.1037/xge0000203. Link

Hathaway, Russel S., et al. “The Relationship of Undergraduate Research Participation to Graduate and Professional Education Pursuit: An Empirical Study.” Journal of College Student Development, vol. 43, no. 5, Sept. 2002. Link

McGee, Richard, and Jill L Keller. “Identifying future scientists: predicting persistence into research training.” CBE life sciences education vol. 6,4 (2007): 316-31. http://doi.org/10.1187/cbe.07-04-0020 Link

Solorzano, Daniel, et al. “Critical Race Theory, Racial Microaggressions, and Campus Racial Climate: The Experiences of African American College Students.” The Journal of Negro Education, vol. 69, no. 1/2, 2000. Link

Thiry, Heather, and Sandra L. Laursen. “The Role of Student-Advisor Interactions in Apprenticing Undergraduate Researchers into a Scientific Community of Practice.” Journal of Science Education and Technology, vol. 20, no. 6, 2011. Link

Williams, Joan C., et al. “Tools for change: Boosting the retention of women in the stem pipeline.” Journal of Research in Gender Studies, vol. 6, no. 1, 2016. https://doi.org/10.22381/jrgs6120161. Link

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