TEACHING TRAINING AND SUPPORT:
TEACHING PORTFOLIO - DEVELOP - ADVISING EXAMPLE

 

V. Advising Example
 
Associate Professor (Clinical Track)
 
From 1997-2000 I advised and mentored 6 residents. This involved meeting with each of them quarterly, discussing their concerns as well as professional and personal goals. We reviewed their rotation evaluations, in-training exam scores, and conference attendance. Evidence of impact is difficult to measure in our system. Many of my interactions involve individual needs of the resident. For example, one of my advisees commuted approximately 90 minutes daily. By the time she has completed her day as a resident, made her commute home and taken care of her young children, she has no time to read in a general medicine text about her patients’ problems. She and I met, identified the problem and I arranged for her to get an Internal Medicine Board Review Course on audiotape. She reviewed general internal medicine topics in her car during her commute. I also do a good deal of informal advising for the rheumatology fellows. We frequently discuss professional and personal goals and how best to accomplish them.
 
Professor (Tenure Track)
 
My philosophy of mentoring was described briefly in the section on Philosophy of Education. I believe my responsibilities as a mentor are as follows. 1) To develop an appropriate research project which will meet the training needs of the student. For example, undergraduate students usually require very circumscribed projects which will fit into the short time-frame in which they are working in the lab. Graduate students require a project which is novel but not highly risky or open-ended, and which will provide a good thesis or dissertation regardless of what the answer to the major thesis question is. Postdoctoral fellows can work on more than one project, and can take on a higher degree of risk, but it is crucial that they work in areas which will provide regularly publishable results, so they can establish records which will allow them to be competitive for future employment. For each type of student, I should provide sufficient background so that they fully understand the rationale behind what they are working on. 2) To provide frequent opportunities for discussion and feedback to each student. I interact with each person in my lab at our weekly 1.5-hour lab meetings, and have frequent scientific discussions with them on a usually daily basis. I still work at the bench myself, and thus maintain "hands-on" knowledge of the techniques being used in the lab. This close interaction also allows me to spot technical problems and potential interpersonal frictions at a very early stage, and to deal effectively with them before major problems arise. 3) To provide students with ample opportunities to learn and practice career skills. In addition to presenting research progress at thesis/dissertation committee meetings, each of my graduate students presents data at student seminar programs specific to the department or program they are pursuing their degrees in. In addition, the Immunology Program runs a summer seminar series at which graduate students and postdoctoral fellows present their researh; my trainees participate in this forum as well. As soon as they have enough data, I provide students and fellows the opportunity to present their work at 1-2 national meetings each year. I also use several methods to improve their critical analysis skills. I have organized a very well-attended Immunology Journal Club since 1992 for students, fellows and faculty. Presentation slots are reserved for students and fellows, with priority given to the former. Each of my students presents papers 3 times/year at this forum, and I give them feedback on their presentations. As an Associate Editor for The Journal of Immunology, and an ad hoc reviewer for a number of other journals, I review a rather large number of manuscripts. When I receive a paper for review, I make a copy and give it to one of my trainees on a rotating basis. Then, after both I and the trainee have read the paper and each written an independent review, we meet and discuss the paper and our reviews. Each of my students also writes their own manuscripts. While I provide ample feedback and advice, I want each student to develop his or her own style, and to leave my lab with good skills in both speaking and writing. All but one of my past and current trainees has been an author on at least one published paper since joining my lab, and the one who has not has only spent one year in the lab thus far. The only student who has completed a degree in my lab who has not had a first-authored full length paper in a high quality peer-reviewed journal was an M.S. student whose research time was very limited due to unusually narrow time constraints placed on him by his employer, the U.S. Army. However, he was a middle author on a subsequent publication from our lab which built in part on his thesis work. Details on trainee participation in publications from my lab can be seen in my C.V.
 
I also serve a mentoring role by serving as an advisor to students who are not in my laboratory. As a member of the Graduate Studies Committee of the Immunology Program, I have served as a formal advisor to first-year students each year, as they do not yet have dissertation advisors. This has involved providing guidance with selection of courses and research rotations, as well as advice when problems arise. My other advising role has been in service on dissertation committees of students not in my lab. I have served on committees for 19 such students thus far, and am on 7 currently. In the Immunology Program, the student’s mentor does not serve as the committee Chair. I am the Chair of 3 committees for students not in my lab, which involves running the meeting, and generating a summary of the meeting and recommendations for the student, to be sent to the Graduate Studies Committee and other committee members. In the Immunology Program, dissertation advisors who do not have a Ph.D. and have not yet advised a student to completion of a Ph.D. must select a "mentor of record" who meets regularly with student and advisor to oversee the graduate training and provide advice and guidance. I am currently serving as "mentor of record" to Kira Gantt in Dr. Mary Wilson’s lab.
 
A list of undergraduate and graduate students as well as fellows I have mentored can be found in the appendix.