Collaborative Mentorship Project Proposal
While we have an excellent trove of department information available in a network of BOX folders, people often access these resources through a direct search rather than taking the time to explore them in depth, meaning that we don’t always know what we could be looking for in the absence of an introductory roadmap. Added to this, graduate students rarely seek out ways to contribute to these folders, and yet current graduate students are some of the people who are best able to offer information and support.
As members of the department who have a wide range of experiences, we have the opportunity to support our colleagues by co-creating materials to preserve institutional knowledge. This would allow us to provide wider, more focused access to some of the information that graduate students often learn only through informal mentorship networks.[1]
A department-specific sourcebook could help graduate students understand disciplinary conventions, access field-specific resources, or navigate the job market. Graduate students, faculty, and staff interested in supporting colleagues and attracting future applicants might find it useful to provide a centralized set of resources for succeeding within the range of sub-disciplines in our department.
In addition to giving us the chance to frame and supplement the resources that are available to graduate students in this department, constructing a guidebook would also enable us to ask colleagues what kinds of new information would be helpful for incoming and early-stage graduate colleagues in our fields.
A Process Note: If or when this sourcebook has more contributors, we will remove this proposal description and replace it with a public-facing statement of intent for this document.
How to Contribute
There are multiple ways to contribute to this text.
Contribute directly:
- You’re welcome to join this Pressbook text as an administrator. This will grant you equal editing access to all aspects of this guidebook. To do so, please email Naomi Salmon directly.
- You can use the Hypothes.is annotation sidebar to leave comments on individual sections of text.
- You can contribute feedback using some of the embedded Google documents in many pages of this text.
- You can also email Naomi Salmon with suggestions to incorporate into the text.
- Note: as others become interested in holding administrative access to this resource, our hope is that we will have multiple point-people who will be willing to edit this text directly when colleagues have suggestions. Ideally, this resource will have enough ongoing contributors to maintain it as a living, up-to-date document beyond 2018.
Respond to English Department listserv queries:
We’ll send out intermittent email prompts for department members to respond to as we put together an individual page for this resource.[2]
For example:
- Where are good places for English graduate students to find employment during the summer?
- What is your favorite notetaking resource or productivity tool?
Have a relevant question you’d like to ask your peers? Feel free to suggest a prompt for the listserv.
- These networks are amazing, but the problem with this structure is that not everyone has equal access to guidance from peers who know the most pertinent information for them. (Think, for instance, of someone whose field of study isn't well-represented in our department.) There's much more to be said about how the factors that make it easiest for people to establish informal networks of peers in graduate school--unstructured time to spend on-campus or at department events, consistent physical and mental health, ease of transport, ease of interpreting and inhabiting the unspoken rules of department interactions, etc.--all represent different forms of privilege. ↵
- As of February 2018, "we" refers to "Naomi and anyone else who expresses interest in taking a more active role in this resource." ↵
