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Mentoring Resources

The National Institute of General Medical Sciences describes mentoring as "a relationship between a more experienced person, the mentor, and a less experienced person, the mentee or trainee, within which important career skills are transferred from one to the other. The mentoring relationship is an agreement between two people that the mentor will take a long-term interest in the career development and aspirations of the mentee. This is a serious responsibility for the mentor, who must accept that he or she has taken on an important, perhaps life-long, role in another's career." The resources below are available to support and enhance the mentor-mentee relationship.

  • Office of the Provost Mentoring Resources
    This website contains a list of resources for faculty on mentoring, well-being, and diversity, equity and inclusion education. See the Resources on Well-being and Institutional Equity Programs and Offices at Northwestern.

  • Office of the Provost Foundational Principles of Mentoring
    The Office of the Provost has developed four foundational principles of mentoring for Northwestern faculty. These principles are applicable across the various contexts of mentoring and can help ensure that the benefits of mentorship extend to individuals, units, and the institution. Each principle includes examples of best practices that can be used to develop and support mentoring activities. See the Four Foundational Principles of Mentoring Practice.

  • National Research Mentoring Network
    Five institutions were awarded funds to develop a national network to provide evidence-based and culturally-aware mentorship, grantsmanship training and other professional development, networking opportunities, and resources to mentors and their trainees across the biomedical sciences. Programming is available to support scientists throughout their career, from undergraduate students to senior faculty members. See the National Research Mentoring Network (NRMN).

  • Center for the Improvement of Mentored Experiences in Research (CIMER)
    CIMER faculty and staff investigate approaches for improving research mentoring relationships for organizations and institutions. We develop, implement and evaluate mentor and mentee training using theoretically-grounded, evidence-based, and culturally-responsive training interventions and investigations. See CIMER

  • Northwestern University CTSI Mentoring Alignment Checklist
    The CTSI Mentoring Alignment Checklist features items for trainee and mentor expectations.

  • AAMC Compact Between Postdoctoral Appointees and Their Mentors
    The Compact is intended to initiate discussions at the local and national levels about the postdoctoral trainee-mentor relationship and the commitments necessary for a high-quality postdoctoral training experience.

  • AAMC Compact Between Biomedical Graduate Students and Their Research Advisors
    These guiding principles are intended to support the development of a positive mentoring relationship between the predoctoral student and their research advisors.

  • ICTR Mentoring Compacts/Contracts Examples
    These are five different frameworks to help each other mentor customize your own compact.

  • Foundational Principles of Mentoring for Faculty (STEM and Humanities and Social Science)
    As part of an initiative to improve mentor-mentee relationships and keep in line with best practices in graduate education, The Graduate School (TGS) offers two workshops in faculty mentor training, one specifically for Humanities and Social Science disciplines, and one for STEM disciplines. The program, titled “Foundational Principles of Mentoring for Faculty,” is based on the Provost’s Mentoring Council’s recommendations for best practices in mentoring, and the Center for Leadership’s expertise in faculty training. Topics covered include refining your mentoring philosophy and plans, aligning expectations with mentees while cultivating trust, building awareness and support for equitable and inclusive practices, fostering mentee professional development, and assessing mentoring efficacy.  The purpose of this initiative is to help faculty cultivate their mentoring skills in an open and empathetic environment, making Northwestern a more equitable and collaborative educational environment for our graduate students and postdoctoral researchers.  The training is typically offered twice a year for STEM faculty and twice a year for Humanities and Social Science faculty.