Counsel in the heart of man is like deep water; but a man of understanding will draw it out. –Â Proverbs 20:5, KJV
Even if you have good mentors, learning wisdom from them is a skill. It’s an art that takes a lifetime, and I certainly haven’t mastered it. But the wisest people I know do several things. They ask good questions, they observe carefully, and they follow up with those from whom they’ve learned. Here are some thoughts on applying these patterns in your grad school mentoring relationships:
Finding and asking good questions. What kinds of questions have you found it helpful to ask?
1.    Finding good questions
It seems obvious that asking good questions is one of the keys to getting sound advice. But sometimes in graduate school I felt that I didn’t even know which questions to ask. Over time I found that it was helpful to ask questions raised by a specific project, questions raised by my own life, and questions raised by things a mentor does particularly well. I also found it helpful to have a general question or two that I asked a wide variety of people.
Athena, in the shape of Mentor, and Telemachus. John Flaxman (1755–1826).
Now that we’ve explored some ways to find mentors as an undergrad, I’d like to transition and focus on some elements that make up the art of being mentored. I hope that what I say here will be helpful across a range of mentoring situations, but I think it’s particularly applicable to graduate students. Since many graduate students spend more than four years in their programs, mentoring relationships in grad school are often long-term. Professors frequently begin to treat you more like a junior colleague and less like a student, so mentors are often a bit more open about their professional interests and challenges, and about the balance of their work and personal lives. Being mentored in this way is an art, one that needs to be honed over time just as much as skills like academic writing or teaching large lecture classes. The first art I’d like to address is the art of recognizing and engaging with different kinds of mentoring.
Last week, I gave some general thoughts on finding good mentors as an undergraduate. This week, I’ll talk a bit about finding mentors who share your beliefs. This is not in any way to minimize the value of mentors who have different views about life. I’ve learned valuable skills, knowledge, and virtues from mentors who had completely different assumptions about the way the world works. It’s often quite helpful to have a mentor who will challenge your deepest beliefs about the world. But, as in most things, it’s also helpful to find some mentors who see things from a similar angle and can deepen your understanding of how your faith and your field interact. And it can be a difficult task.
Many professors are hesitant to talk about their own epistemology in class, in the commendable desire to give students room to express their individual viewpoints. And as a student, it can be intimidating to ask a professor what he or she believes, even in an individual conversation during office hours. Leaving those issues aside, it’s simply hard to build community in the rush of managing course schedules and extracurriculars. Here are a few ways to look if you’re trying to find mentors who share belief in Christ. Some of these thoughts are easier to apply in graduate school (the suggestion about going to conferences, for instance), but I hope that they’re helpful to think about in undergrad as well. If you are interested in graduate school, applying some of these suggestions will help to prepare for that as well. [Read more…] about Finding Mentors Who Share Your Faith
Everyone agrees that mentoring is important at every phase of an academic career, but finding mentors and growing in mentoring relationships can be a challenge. In follow-up to and to expand upon Resource for Grad Student mentoring of Undergraduates (5/29/2012). I’ll be doing a series on finding and growing in mentoring relationships as an undergraduate and grad student. I’d welcome comments and stories.
Later in the series I’ll give a few thoughts on finding mentors as a graduate student, maintaining and growing in mentoring relationships, and mentoring others in turn. But for the moment, here are a few ideas on finding mentors while you’re in undergrad. In this post, I’ll give a few general suggestions. In the next post, I’ll turn to ways of finding Christian mentors in your field as an undergrad.
 1.   Pray for good mentors.
Years ago, I was looking for someone who could mentor me in creative writing. I was an English major, but my undergraduate school didn’t really focus on creative writing, so I didn’t know where to look. Feeling a bit lost, I prayed about it. Not too long after that, I went to a teaching job interview. The headmaster of the school noticed on my resume that I was interested in writing, and during the interview he mentioned that his wife was a poet. I later met her and started working on writing with her. Her advice transformed my style and convinced me to write poetry, something I’d always been afraid of. A decade later, I still write poetry, and I still learn incredible things from the friend God sent me when I prayed for a mentor.
Johns Hopkins University Graduate Christian Fellowship Friday Lunch on 5/11/2011. Friday lunches provide a regular opportunity for informal conversation, sharing stories, and catching up (with whomever is available at the time).
In a recent visit to Baltimore, I ate lunch with a group of Johns Hopkins University (JHU) graduate students. Dwight Schwartz (InterVarsity’s Graduate & Faculty Ministry Area Director for the MidAtlantic and Campus Staff Member at JHU) couldn’t wait to introduce me to Lisa, whose labors align so well with the passions and vision of the Emerging Scholars Network (ESN). As a first year graduate student, Lisa organized a  mentoring program in which graduate students serve as mentors for undergraduate students.
What the program is about: To increase the undergraduate-graduate interaction and to give undergraduates a Christian perspective about their future, the graduate Christian fellowship has started a mentoring program for students in the undergraduate Christian fellowship. This mentoring program is conducted almost exclusively through email and offers undergrads a chance to ask all sorts of questions about graduate school and careers to graduate students. Along with advice for how to apply and prepare for grad school, the mentors also provide spiritual support. The undergrad students are encouraged to ask their mentors about anything related to graduate school or getting a job or how they keep their Christian faith throughout there years in college. The graduate student mentors are encouraged to also tell about themselves and how they decided to go to graduate school and to connect their mentee to other grad students who can also help them with specific questions or share their grad school experiences. The mentors and mentees email each other approximately weekly. There are no requirements for meeting up or any mandatory activities.