Faculty-graduate student mentoring relationships: mentors’ perceived roles and responsibilities

Abstract

Scholars have demonstrated that one of the most important factors that graduate students use to ascertain the quality of their educational experience is their relationship with faculty. Research on faculty-graduate student mentoring relationships has provided valuable insights about effective practices that foster the success of graduate students. While these relationships are beneficial to both the mentor and mentee, the literature on faculty-student mentoring relationships primarily has focused either on mentoring relationships with undergraduate students or on specific types of interactions between graduate students and faculty. This article adds to the existing literature by exploring faculty mentors' perceived roles and responsibilities in their mentoring relationships with their graduate students. Data were drawn from interviews with 15 underrepresented faculty members from one research university. Findings reveal that faculty-graduate student relationships can be described by three broad descriptors that characterize participants' roles and responsibilities-faculty members as Allies, Ambassadors, and Master-Teachers.

A Developmental Model of Research Mentoring

“…Previous models identified styles, perceived roles, and responsibilities (Lechuga 2011), which highlight various aspects of mentoring such as support and structure (Gatfield 2005). These styles can be person-oriented or task-oriented (Murphy et al 2007).…”

“…Previous models (Lechuga 2011;Lee 2010;Tsai et al 2013) defined roles only for mentors and ignored the roles of students. With roles for both students and mentors, the DMRM explains two types of mismatches that can produce ineffective mentoring relationships: the novice-consultant mismatch and the colleague-director mismatch.…”

“…To describe the mentoring relationship between Latina/o faculty members and graduate students, Lechuga (2011) classified mentors into three categories based on the context and expectations of their interactions with graduate students: allies, ambassadors, and master teachers. An ally invests time and energy into developing the student academically and…”

Masterstudenters opplevelse av møter med veileder: Det er veiledningen som gjør at en føler at en mestrer

“…En slik orientering beskrives også gjennom et ''thesis oriented'' perspektiv, der veiledningen er rettet mot teksten (Burns et al, 1995). Veilederne kan vektlegge instruksjon for å hjelpe studentene til å utvikle spesielle ferdigheter (Lechuga, 2011). Lauvå s og Handal har utviklet kjennetegn på god veiledning, der den akademiske dimensjonen beskrives gjennom ''faglig kompetanse'', ''tilgjengelighet'' og ''fokus på studentens arbeid '' (Lauvå s & Handal, 1998, s. 153).…”

“…Dette inkluderer de personlige og interpersonlige faktorene som er avgjørende i forskningen og de utenforliggende faktorene som innvirker på en slik prosess (Burns et al, 1995). Rollen som veileder inneholder omsorg for studentenes psykologiske helse (Lechuga, 2011). Lauvå s og Handal har beskrevet den personlige dimensjonen gjennom faktorer som ''personlig relasjon'', ''kommunikasjon'' og ''følelsesmessig og motivasjonell støtte'' (Lauvå s & Handal, 1998, s. 153).…”