GPS Faculty Development Workshops
“Effective mentoring at the graduate and postdoctoral stages…has long been identified as an essential catalyst for performance, success and career advancement.”
Academic Practice in Ecology and Education, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/ece3.4527
“Students with good mentors are more likely to have productive, distinguished, and ethical careers that reflect credit on the mentors and enrich the discipline. Effective mentoring helps ensure the quality of research, scholarship, and teaching well into the future.”
Rackham Graduate School, University of Michigan, “How to Get the Mentoring You Want: A Guide for Graduate Students” https://rackham.umich.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/mentoring.pdf
Faculty mentors play a crucial role in the success of graduate students, which means faculty mentors play a crucial role in the success of graduate programs. Research consistently shows the connection between mentoring and a graduate student’s scholarly wellbeing—from productivity and confidence to program satisfaction. By better equipping faculty mentors, we will improve the quality of both our programs and the experience of our students.
Beginning in Fall 2019, the Graduate School expanded our professional development workshops (GPS) to include Graduate Faculty Development. We offer workshops each semester, virtual and in-person. We invite Graduate Program Directors and Graduate faculty to join us in these workshops as we work together to improve graduate education at Baylor. Spring workshops will specifically target new graduate faculty as well as graduate program directors. Invitations to GPS Faculty workshops will be sent out in the GPD updates.
GPS Faculty Workshops
How To Mentor Graduate Students: A Guide for New Graduate Faculty
What does it mean to be a good graduate mentor? Many faculty never experienced good mentoring themselves nor have received training in how to mentor well. This workshop will explore what mentoring means within the context of 21st century graduate education and help faculty develop clear strategies to become better mentors. It will also suggest a framework for creating mentoring guides for specific programs and for establishing better mentoring relationships within departments.
How a Mentoring Agreement Will Help You
Early conversations between advisors and advisees that establish professional relationship expectations can make mentoring relationships more successful. The Graduate School strongly suggests that advisor/advisee pairs utilize a mentoring agreement to structure expectations, build mutual trust and respect, and establish appropriate boundaries. Mentoring agreements do not serve as a legal document, but rather as an agreement between advisor and advisee. This workshop will explore the rationale behind mentoring agreements and provide the framework for establishing successful mentoring agreements.
Difficult Conversations: How to Have Hard Conversations with Graduate Students
Working with graduate students often means having difficult conversations with graduate students. This workshop will provide skills to help graduate faculty navigate conversations from personal crises to adviser conflict to academic progress. It will provide guidelines on how to handle these conversations well, and will include advice from experienced graduate faculty.
How Not To Be Sued
We have noticed an increase in the early dismissal of graduate students from programs and dissatisfied graduate students turning to legal recourse to settle disputes with programs and mentors. While sometimes this will just happen, there are also clear steps departments and mentors can take to reduce the number of student dismissals and lawsuits. This workshop will combine legal advice with practical advice to provide graduate faculty and programs the strategies needed to prevent and/or deal with these difficult situations.