Theodore Hodapp

How do we learn to be mentors?

I recently had the unfortunate occasion to read direct comments from graduate students at a number of universities that were conducting APS Climate Site Visits. These visits, sponsored by the APS Committee on the Status of Women in Physics and the Committee on Minorities are a sort of external program review, but with a singular focus on the climate for women and/or minorities in the department. As a part of these visits, we send a survey to all graduate students and ask a number of questions that help reveal the underlying emotions and concerns of this group.

Reading these comments, mostly from women, was alternately awe inspiring and devastating. They spoke of the relationship with their research advisor. Many felt this individual “launched” their career, helped them understand the intricacies of independent research, and would be a life-long collaborator or colleague. Some, however, expressed how this relationship had made them hate physics. Hate. Physics.

This sort of devastation does irreparable harm to an individual. To me it cuts deep into my own personal feelings of how physics can be a positive force for understanding the universe and our relationship with that world view. I think to myself, how is it that we as a community allow such harm to be done? Or, as an educator, how are we providing support for mentors and advisors to improve their skills in this area? We now help new faculty learn how to be more effective in the classroom at helping their students learn through programs like the New Faculty Workshop, but we are still fairly absent from the discussion of the importance of this mentor-mentee relationship and providing support that can help improve these experiences.

The APS is starting to take some steps in this direction. In the extension of the APS Bridge Program (the broader effort now labeled IGEN, or the Inclusive Graduate Education Network), we received funding from the NSF to partner with CIMER (Center for the Improvement of Mentored Experiences in Research) to build research mentor training materials – in this case for the mentors of new postdocs entering National Labs. APS is also in the process of updating its ethics statement, and will be working with the committees on education, women, and minorities, among others, to help inform a new standing APS committee on ethics. Part of the charge to this committee is to “develop, maintain and disseminate materials” that will support and inform how we foster productive and positive professional relationships.

We have a ways to go but recognizing the problem rather than sweeping it under one of our professional rugs is a good first step. How do we take the next step? What is the role of the Director of Graduate Studies in the health of these relationships? Or, the role of the larger graduate faculty? What strategies do we develop and propagate to improve the experiences for all students – especially those who enter studies, full of the excitement about the power of physics to help us understand the universe, only to leave full of resentment? We need to do better. Let me know what you think (hodapp@aps.org).

Disclaimer – The articles and opinion pieces found in this issue of the APS Forum on Education Newsletter are not peer refereed and represent solely the views of the authors and not necessarily the views of the APS.