The Challenges of Designing and Implementing a Doctoral Student Mentoring Program
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The Challenges of Designing and Implementing a Doctoral Student Mentoring Program Karri A. Holley & Mary Lee Caldwell
Published online: 12 November 2011 # Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2011
Abstract The relationship between doctoral students and faculty members has been identified as a key component of a successful graduate school experience. In this article, we consider the challenges inherent in designing and implementing a formal doctoral student mentoring program. By bringing together students, peer mentors, and faculty mentors, the program sought to introduce a team-based platform to facilitate student success. We specifically consider how program components might be scaled up across the institution, providing both a personal and supportive relationship for participants as well as an information resource for the broader student population. Key words Doctoral students . Retention . Programming
The high student attrition rate from doctoral degree programs in the United States remains a troubling aspect of higher education. Half of the students who begin a doctoral program ultimately fail to complete their degree (Bair and Haworth 2004; Gardner 2008). Efforts to improve degree completion generally focus on financial support, academic preparation, professional development, and mentoring relationships (Bair and Haworth 2004). Davidson and Foster-Johnson (2001, p. 549) emphasized the significance of mentoring, explaining, “The cultivation of developmental or mentoring relationships between graduate students and their professors is a critical factor in determining the successful completion of graduate programs.”
Karri A. Holley is Assistant Professor of Higher Education at the University of Alabama. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Southern California. Her research interests include interdisciplinarity, graduate education, and qualitative inquiry. Mary Lee Caldwell is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Alabama. She received her B.A. and M.S. from Troy University. Her research interests include organizational change, leadership development, and civic engagement. K. A. Holley (*) : M. L. Caldwell University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL, USA e-mail: [email protected] M. L. Caldwell e-mail: [email protected]
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Innov High Educ (2012) 37:243–253
Mentoring is a cornerstone of the most effective and promising practices recognized by the Council of Graduate Schools’ Ph.D. Completion Project (2010), and a wealth of research supports the influence of mentoring relationships on successful student outcomes (i.e., Baird 1995; Golde and Dore 2001; Paglis et al. 2006). Anderson and Shannon (1988, p. 40) defined mentoring as “a nurturing process in which a more skilled or experienced person, serving as a role model, teaches, sponsors, encourages, counsels and befriends a less skilled or less experienced person for the purpose of promoting the latter’s professional and/or personal development.” While doctoral students typically work with an advisor during the dissertation process, a mentoring relat
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