Statement on Faculty Mentoring
The School of Arts and Sciences requires that each newly hired tenure-stream faculty member be provided with appropriate mentoring. If the School’s ambition for excellence is to be sustained, outstanding faculty must not only be hired, but supported as they develop their careers as teachers, scholars, and researchers. The role of the mentor is not to replace but to complement the chair’s responsibility to advise tenure-stream faculty.
I. The Role of the Department Chair
The chair of the department is responsible for assigning a mentor to each newly hired tenure-stream faculty member. Larger departments may choose to constitute an individual mentoring committee for each new faculty member.
II. Duties of the Mentor
- Understand and discuss the discipline’s expectations for tenure;
- Understand and discuss the department’s expectations for tenure;
- Answer questions about specific practices of the discipline with regard to applying for grants, publishing research, etc.;
- Emphasize the importance of building strong teaching and research dossiers;
- Provide information about sources of support for teaching at the University;
- Be willing to answer specific questions (e.g., how to prioritize a research plan, where to publish, how to negotiate interdisciplinary collaborations);
- Be willing to discuss the social dimension of becoming a departmental colleague;
- Use the occasion of working with a younger colleague to learn.
III. Responsibilities of New Faculty Members
- Be active participants in the mentoring relationship;
- Understand the tenure process;
- Seek help early about difficulties in the classroom;
- Learn how to explain their research to colleagues who are not in their own field;
- Listen to advice, but remember that they are ultimately responsible for their own work.
IV. Mentoring Beyond the Department
Occasionally it may be helpful to a new faculty member to have a mentor from another department. This may be the case, for instance, in a small department where there is no good match for the particular expertise of a new faculty member. Or, a woman in a heavily male department might request that a woman from another department be invited to join the departmental mentor. In such cases the chair, in consultation with the Senior Associate Dean, should make appropriate arrangements. However, the purpose of mentoring within the School of Arts and Sciences is primarily to ensure that new faculty have every opportunity for academic success. Because tenure decisions are highly discipline-specific, outside mentoring can supplement but not replace the specific advice about tenure standards and practices which only senior departmental colleagues can provide.