What is mentoring?

Mentoring has been a mainstay among faculty in colleges and universities for at least two decades.  As new faculty enter academic positions, they meet challenges that can make the process of becoming a “colleague” uncomfortable, and even discouraging.  Even more seasoned faculty who have joined Loyola after years at another institution will encounter an unfamiliar college culture.  Mentors offer guidance: they interpret the environment for newcomers, and serve as an anchor and an information source.  They can be the key to a new faculty member’s sense of comfort in the College’s community.

Tenured faculty members, usually volunteering for a single academic year (unless they wish to volunteer for a longer period), guide untenured, tenure track faculty as they develop professionally and approach important junctures in their professional lives.  All parties, mentors and protégés, agree to participate in a formalized program that includes convenient mentor-protégé meetings, organized, professional development seminars as necessary, and social events during the academic year.  Participation is voluntary, though strongly encouraged.  One’s success in the tenure process is not dependent upon participation in the Faculty-To-Faculty Mentoring Program.

The faculty-to-faculty mentoring relationship is quite flexible.  Untenured faculty consult with mentors about their goals, and may change and re-shape them as the pair deems necessary.  The mentoring pair may wish to periodically include department chairs in their discussions.  They may focus on teaching, research, service, scholarly production, or any academic and professional development matter that they agree needs attention as the protégé progresses.  Moreover, the relationship assumes a commitment through the academic year on the part of both participants.  While the mentor and the protégé may not share a departmental home, (e.g., depending on the availability of participants, a sociologist may be paired with a psychologist, or a historian may be paired with a literature scholar) the mentor will be well equipped to assist the protégé throughout the term of the relationship.  Mentors’ commitments are to see the protégé toward the achievement of stated goal, connect the protégé with extra-campus resources that may be helpful, and to make sure the protégé has access to, and knows how to, take advantage of all of the professional development services available on campus.