Reverse Mentoring: Untapped Resource in the Academy?
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Reverse Mentoring: Untapped Resource in the Academy? Libby V. Morris 1
# Springer Science+Business Media New York 2017
Recently, I came across the term Breverse mentoring.^ Traditional mentoring and peer mentoring are widely reported in the research literature, and a search of Innovative Higher Education yielded 16 articles published since 2000 with Bmentoring^ in the title and many more with Bmentoring^ as a key word; my search did not find any articles on reverse mentoring. A quick search of other, larger educational data bases produced much the same results. As a quick review, traditional mentoring is typically described as hierarchical and unidimensional. The mentor serves as an Bexpert^ who has knowledge and power, while the mentee is a Bnovice^ learner. Mentoring functions include the mentor as a dispenser of academic/ professional advice, a guide in career development, a supporter of psychological/emotional needs, and role model. Interactions may be somewhat informal or part of a highly structured departmental or college-wide program, and the relationship may occur across a well-defined or more loosely defined time-period. Face-to-face interactions are the norm; however, an increasing use of technology in mentoring was foreshadowed by Bierema and Merriam’s 2002 article on BE-mentoring^ in Innovative Higher Education. Mentoring programs may be holistic in design and serve specific student groups (e.g., doctoral students, undergraduates, underrepresented students, at-risk students) or be targeted toward selected students and success in specific fields (e.g., STEM, liberal arts, professional fields). Mentoring in the academy extends far beyond student groups and includes programs to assist women, early career, and underrepresented faculty in navigating the career ladder and departmental and college cultures. In all cases, as suggested by the literature, mentoring programs should be contextually and culturally sensitive. In addition to traditional mentoring programs, the educational literature contains extensive works on peer mentoring. Similar to traditional mentoring, the purpose is to enable success in academic and career matters and in social/emotional dimensions. Sometimes called Bpeer coaching,^ the peer mentoring relationship is less hierarchical and more balanced in power. Some writers assert that peer mentoring may be highly effective overall, and especially effective in the psycho-social dimension where close connections may be established around shared life-stage challenges and opportunities. Peer mentoring may take place on many levels: * Libby V. Morris [email protected]
1
University of Georgia, Athens, GA, USA
Innov High Educ
faculty member-to-faculty member, graduate student-to-graduate student, or undergraduate-toundergraduate. Like traditional mentoring, formal peer programs are carefully designed in regard to process and expected outcomes. Very little has been written on reverse mentoring, and the existing literature (beyond opinion pieces in periodicals) focuses primarily on reverse ment
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