Student Training Promotes Mentoring Awareness and Action.

Student training is a critical but often overlooked aspect of the mentoring process. Composite mentoring, involving the strategic selection of a diverse set of mentors, is proposed to guide students to take a more active role in their own mentoring experiences. A mentoring program with composite mentoring as a guiding framework was designed and implemented for college women pursuing science careers. The effectiveness of the program is illustrated, and students reported enhanced mentoring and career-related experiences. Implications for advising, career counseling, and mentoring program design are discussed. It would help if the mentor was the type of person who you wanted to become. The university does have a lot of mentoring programs where they pair people up. But I wouldn't identity very well with a 50-year-old single woman who's never been married. I need to find somebody who is in their mid-30s, had a family, took time off to be with her family, went back, and explain all that. -Nicole, former chemistry student I don't have just one mentor. My mother is a woman and has a family and a job. But, I don't want to be a Spanish teacher. On the other hand, my boss is a doctor. I want to be a doctor. But, there are very many ways in which he's different from me. I think you really have to select the ways in which you say-this is what I want to be. -Selina, current premedical student A mentor is traditionally defined as an older, more experienced person who acts as a guide, advocate, and teacher to a younger, less experienced person (Casey & Shore, 2000). Mentors can provide career, academic, psychosocial, and role modeling functions both within and outside of a school setting (Donaldson, Ensher, & Grant-Vallone, 2000). There are many benefits that students receive from mentoring during the college years and beyond. Mentoring can positively influence the career choices students make (Simpson, 1996), their persistence in pursuing their educational goals (Gloria, Robinson Kurpius, Hamilton, & Willson, 1999), and their success in higher education (Blake-Beard, 1999). When considering the personal and career development of women, mentoring relationships are regarded as critical, yet highly complex (Blake-Beard, 1999; Hubbard & Robinson, 1998; Sosik & Godshalk, 2000). Women may try to seek mentors who can shed light on combining their personal and professional lives (Gilbert & Rossman, 1992), an issue that often discourages college women from persisting in fields that are nontraditional ones for women, such as science (e.g., Seymour & Hewitt, 1997). However, they may not experience mentoring that adequately addresses their concerns (Frestedt, 1995). Also, women may perceive (Ragins & Cotton, 1991) and experience greater barriers to establishing mentoring relationships than do men (Noe, 1988). Because role modeling is considered an important component of the mentoring process (Donaldson et al., 2000), it is natural that college students might search, albeit unsuccessfully, for one mentor who resembles the person they want to become. How can career development counselors and faculty advisers help students, especially women and other students who are likely to encounter barriers to mentoring, to identify and to access the mentoring experience that is available to them? In this article, I suggest that student training is a critical but often overlooked aspect of the mentoring process. Whether in the context of a formal program or an informal advisory relationship, students can learn to take a more active role in their mentoring experience, creatively meeting their desire to find mentors who match their hoped-for future selves. These ideas are reflected in the description and evaluation of the current mentoring program I designed and implemented, and they have implications for college-level advising, career counseling, and design of future mentoring programs. …