Summary, Guiding Questions #6

What are effective mentoring strategies for graduate students, postdocs, and tenure-track faculty within scientific ocean drilling? How can we expand on effective mentoring, especially for those in historically marginalized groups in STEM?

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Figure 9: Example of the different mentoring structures as suggested in National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine 2019. The Science of Effective Mentorship in STEMM. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/25568.

Provenance: Adriane Lam, SUNY at Binghamton
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Values and Priorities

• Mentoring is important at all career stages. Training and mentoring for those within scientific ocean drilling is critical and necessary components of an effective and long-term program.
• Mentoring is a critical component of attracting and retaining new members to the SciOP community. Increased mentoring activities of early career scientists is critical to increase the participation of new members in scientific ocean drilling, especially those who hold historically excluded identities in STEM. 
• The community wants programmatic attention on expanding and strengthening mentoring opportunities. Support for activities that increase the participation of early career researchers who hold minoritized and historically excluded identities in STEM are especially essential. 

Recommended Tools and/or Strategies

• Create and maintain a database of IODP/scientific ocean drilling scientists who are willing to serve as mentors, especially to students from historically excluded identities in STEM. Such a database would be beneficial to those applying to sail and for students applying to the Schlanger Fellowship. This could be a formal database housed on the IODP/USSSP website, or something as simple as a Slack channel for early career professionals and mentors to connect and chat. Another model may be the Mentoring 365 program. Participants supported pairing mentors with mentees after staffing, prior to sailing, so there is a clear partnership and network created to support first-time scientists to scientific ocean drilling.
• Listen to the needs of students, postdocs, and pre-tenure faculty through listening sessions or surveys. Listening sessions are critical to learning more about the needs of those who hold historically excluded identities in STEM. These needs and requirements should be prioritized when creating and shaping initiatives to increase mentor-mentee relationships within scientific ocean drilling.
• Increase the use of social media and tagging of societies, groups, and clubs. To garner more interest in scientific ocean drilling, and connect potential mentors with mentees, the program should increase its virtual presence to create an online community. Increased use of hashtags and tagging in groups who focus on online community building, especially for scientists who hold historically excluded identities in STEM (e.g., @GeoLatinas, @BlkInGeoscience, @aapigeosci) could help curate such a community. Together with strong mentoring networks, these initiatives could lead to diversifying the pool of scientists in scientific ocean drilling. A list of diverse speakers in STEM and handles to social media accounts can be found here. Examples of application materials (for sailing on expeditions) could be posted publicly on the IODP/USSSP website to help early career applicants compose their applications to sail. Polishing of applications could be furthered through a mentoring network.
• Develop and offer training programs to foster effective mentoring and to develop transdisciplinary professional skills. Such training programs are especially critical to scientists who cannot or do not wish to sail, but do use scientific ocean drilling samples in their research. Expanded training and networking opportunities will provide additional opportunities for leadership development among early career scientists, a space for mentor and mentee relationships to develop, and provide a networking forum for scientific ideas to prosper.

Challenges

• Several institutions currently do not house professors who have sailed with IODP or are involved with the program. This creates a lack of mentors who can effectively guide students through the process of applying to sail and for pursuing other opportunities through scientific ocean drilling. 
• Training mentors to effectively mentor their mentees is currently lacking. This could be overcome by providing mandatory training to mentors prior to expeditions, before adding their name and contact information to databases, etc. 
• The need to move away from the 'one size fits all' model of mentoring. Creation of such mentoring programs need to recognize that not all mentors are compatible with any mentee, and require mechanisms in place for mentees to safely find new mentors, and vice versa. The are also different structures of the mentor / mentee relationship to be considered (Figure 9).
• Creating a structure and framework for effectively pairing more advanced scientists with early career scientists for expeditions. Such a structure should also include a mechanism for mentors or mentees to leave the mentoring relationship. 
• The bias in application to sail process. Participants emphasized the need to reduce this bias is critical, as privilege accumulates on CVs. 
• Consideration of  engaging scientists who are not able to or do not wish to sail.
• Creating a culture of respect, learning, mentoring, and growth on expeditions. Experiences regarding ship culture have ranged from very positive, to incidences of bullying and disrespect. Positive experiences shipboard, especially for early career researchers and for those who hold historically excluded identities, is critical for continued participation of scientists in the program.