Eighteen first-year graduate students in the Pratt School of Engineering are benefiting from personalized mentoring through a new program offered by the Engineering Graduate Student Council.
Launched last August, the program pairs older graduate students with incoming graduate students to encourage one-on-one mentorship. Mentors and mentees, who do not necessarily share the same specialization, are free to discuss any topic and can arrange their own meetings.
“The mentoring is very individually based because there are so many different backgrounds in different students,” said EGSC president Justin Migacz, who specializes in electrical and computer engineering. “The structure is good because everyone’s experiences are personalized.”
Proposed last Spring, the idea for the program involved graduate students mentoring undergraduates. After making several changes to the first proposal, however, EGSC decided to target the program specifically at graduate students.
Feedback from mentors and mentees has generally been positive, Migacz said.
Many mentors and mentees said the informal nature of the meetings can open discussions in many different subjects that often extend beyond academics.
“Certainly that is one of the things that happens and is one of the reasons to have a student mentor even if your academic advisor is amazing,” said mentor Randy Evans, a sixth-year electrical and computer engineering graduate student.
Evans added that meeting people outside his discipline can also be very insightful.
Tiffany Wilson, a first-year civil engineering graduate student, said her mentor and the people she meets through her mentor give student perspectives that she does not receive from administrators or other faculty members.
In turn, by helping other students, mentors may gain leadership experience through the program, Migacz said.
EGSC also arranges various social events for participating students. In addition, mentors and mentees can actively participate in the program’s online forum.
Pratt Human Resources Manager Suzanne Blankfard said she hopes the program will continue to develop in the coming years.
“One of our goals is to make use of this semester as a pilot semester,” she said. “We want to tweak the program after this year according to feedback and expand the program in the future. We want to create a good school community with these mentorships.”
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.