Will all mentors be paired with students? 

We do our best to pair students with mentors that have similar interests and career goals. We cannot guarantee that all mentors will be paired with students. Usually there is a surplus of mentors.

What is the time commitment for Friend in STEM?

Friend in STEM does not have a requirement for number or frequency of meetings for mentors and mentees. We leave it up to you and the student to figure out what works best and what is needed to achieve the student’s goals. It is our hope that this freedom will allow you and the student to decide how much time each of you is willing/able to invest. Some students would just like to meet once as an “informational interview” while others meet periodically with their mentors or even begin working in the lab of their mentor. 

What if my student doesn’t respond to my emails? 

Please let us know if you cannot get a hold of your student. If that is the case, we will attempt to contact them again. In the case that students do not respond, we will open you up to be a mentor for another student. 

What if I get too busy and can’t meet with my student? 

We understand that the life of a scientist can be stressful and busy. Please let us know if you would like to withdraw yourself from being a mentor so we can pair that student with another mentor. 

Do you provide any mentoring resources for us?

We recognize that many of our mentors have previous experience with mentoring and therefore, we do not have a required mentoring information session. 

There is great information about mentoring found at the Center for Translational Medicine if you are interested in learning more about mentoring. There is also a newly launched podcast called The Science of Mentorship from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine.

What if I have other questions? 

Please feel free to send any additional questions to friendinstem@umn.edu

• Contact your student within 1 week after our email.

• After initial email contact, set up a Zoom meeting with the student.

• Be prepared to provide whatever guidance the student is seeking. This may include helping them pick a lab, draft an email to faculty, or just encouragement!

• Future meetings/contact decided based on goals determined by mentor and student.

• Check in with students 3-5 months after initial contact (or at the end of the semester) to see how they’re doing and if they need any additional guidance!

• You will be paired with one student/semester (dependent on the number of students requesting mentorship).

  • This doesn’t mean that we intend for mentor:mentee relationships to end/begin within a semester time period - the longevity of these contacts will be up to you and the student! 

• At the end of each semester, we will send out a survey to collect the following information: 

  • Are you willing to be paired with an additional student next semester? 

  • What worked? What didn’t work?

Before your first meeting

• Read over these Tips & Guidelines from the Office of Undergraduate Research at the UMN

• Reflect on:

  • Goals of the mentoring relationship

  • What my mentee can expect from me

  • What I expect from my mentee

  • Frequency and duration of meetings

  • Questions I could ask

  • Questions I could be asked

During your first meeting

• Help the student set tangible goals (even if they’re small!) Plan to meet to discuss how things went.

• Let students tell you what they need - listen first, then give advice!

• Allow space for the students’ experiences to be different from your own. 

  • When in doubt, ask if your advice is helpful or applicable.

  • Encourage them to follow their intuition.

• If students are interested in pursuing undergraduate research, be honest with them about the realities of this work environment. 

  • Discuss what healthy mentor/mentee relationships look like.

  • Discuss what healthy lab environments look like.

  • Discuss how to get paid for undergraduate research (see the Resources list on the Student page of this website).

Resources for intentional, inclusive, and uplifting mentorship:

• Making assumptions and failing to recognize our own implicit biases hinder all mentor/mentee relationships. That is why actively listening to mentees and withholding judgment and the instinct to project our own experiences onto mentees are crucial for building the foundations of good mentorship. 

• Information on being an active listener:

  • The 7 qualities of Active Listening for Mentors - Mentorloop

  • Having a Mentoring Conversation - University of Glasgow

• Information on Implicit or Unconscious Bias:

  • The Science of Diversity and the Impact of Implicit Bias - NIH, Office of the Director, Scientific Workforce Diversity

  • “The good, the bad, and the ugly of implicit bias” - Pritlove et. al. Lancet 2019

  • Resources on Unconscious Bias - Northwestern University

  • Online Implicit Association Tests (IATs) - from Project Implicit

• "The Science of Mentorship" - From the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, a 10-part series featuring the personal mentorship stories of leaders in academia, business, and the media.

  • Apple Podcasts

  • Spotify

Resources for your Mentees:

• Research Opportunities list from Friend in Stem (click on “Resources")

• Resources for students who are new to science/research:

  • Ologies podcast: https://www.alieward.com/ologies

  • Science news:

    • Nature

    • Science

• Meet over Zoom.

• Encourage students to email professors about future research opportunities, affording the possibility that in person research may not be available to undergraduates this semester (lab dependent) .

  • Encourage students to ask PIs if they can meet over zoom with lab members to learn more about their research and possible dry-lab projects.

• Invite interested students to other relevant zoom events. (Remember to offer guidance or provide the opportunity for them to ask questions afterwards if students are unfamiliar with these sorts of meetings!)  

  • Lab meetings

  • Journal clubs

  • Seminars