Mentoring

The Graduate College offers Mentoring Workshops based on the Center for the Improvement of Mentored Experiences in Research (CIMER) curriculum. The workshop’s goals are to improve the research mentoring relationships for mentees and mentors through the implementation of evidence-based interventions and strategies. This  mentoring curriculum is used at 130 institutions and been around for over 10 years with many peer-reviewed publications demonstrating its effectiveness and is the same one offered by the Center for Clinical and Translational Science (CCTS) at UIC, but tailored for a more general faculty audience. This workshop series will transform good mentors into great mentors! In addition, you will build community with other faculty at UIC.

We offer GC 520: Mentoring Up, which is a 1 credit hour 8 week course for graduate students. Topics covered include maintaining effective communication, aligning expectations, addressing equity and inclusion, building research self-efficacy, achieving independence, and how to seek professional development.

Mentoring resources at UIC collected by the Provost’s Mentoring Taskforce.

• Mentoring Taskforce Resources

The Individual Development Plan (IDP) concept is used to help students define and pursue their career goals. The IDP should be used to guide conversations around career goals between students and advisors.

• MyIPD, an IDP for STEM
• Imagine PhD, an IDP for Arts, Humanities, and Social Science or non-traditional STEM career planning

Mentor-mentee agreements articulate expectations between mentors and mentees and make invisible expectations visible. These documents should be part of the graduate program’s handbook and can cover topics such as research productivity, authorship guidelines, working hours, communication methods, respect and team expectations, how to seek professional development, and how to resolve conflicts.

• Example Mentor Mentee Agreements from UIC doctoral programs