This phenomenological study (Moustakas, 1994) explores the mentoring needs of 11 engineering postdoctoral scholars of color with an adaptation of the ideal mentoring model (Zambrana et al., 2015) used as the conceptual framework. A critical theory lens (Morrow & Brown, 1994) is applied to Moustakas’ (1994) four-stage process of phenomenological data analysis to examine the interview data: epoché, horizontalization, imaginative variation, and synthesis. The essence of the phenomenon is engineering postdoctoral scholars of color have primary and secondary mentoring needs pertaining to their immediate career acquisition of a tenure-track faculty position. Primary mentoring needs include expanding professional networks for the tenure-track faculty job search and receiving guidance on work-life balance and enhancing technical skills. Secondary needs consist of refining research directions and research expertise promotion, as well as acquiring political guidance on matters of race/ethnicity in academia. These findings reveal the importance of higher education institutions and postdoctoral supervisors assuming greater responsibility for ensuring postdoctoral scholars receive the mentorship and career support they desire, which may require a systematic change in the postdoctoral training environment.
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Negotiating mentoring relationships and support for Black and Brown early‐career faculty
In this essay, we share historical and structural components of mentoring within institutions of higher education and grapple with technical and moral obligations of support. We argue for more humanizing approaches that embed personal, social, and cultural aspects of mentoring, and seek to disrupt the purposes of mentoring, and for whom? Using a critical approach, we promote justice-oriented and equity-driven models of mentoring that account for excessive teaching loads and service commitments for faculty at minority-serving institutions and Black and Brown faculty at predominantly White institutions. Current promotion and tenure publish or perish models neglect the intellectual and scholarly contributions made through teaching and service and therefore hold the same level of expectations for engagement in and dissemination of research. We share our own stories as Faculty of Color navigating institutional structures during the promotion and tenure process, while also negotiating incongruent cultures of our personal and professional lives. Furthermore, we address the need for mentoring and networking within exclusionary spaces to support the productivity and critical research agendas of Black and Brown faculty that often challenge the white heteronormative cultures of our institutions, professional organizations, peer-reviewed journals, and prestigious funding mechanisms. Implications of this essay include an acknowledgment of oppressive systems that early-career Black and Brown faculty often navigate and a call for diverse mentoring programs and supports that conform with and validate our lives and needs. Furthermore, we provide recommendations on evidence-based resources and approaches that are available to science, technology, engineering, and mathematics faculty and science educators.
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- Award ID(s):
- 2029956
- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10340180
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Science Education
- Volume:
- 106
- Issue:
- 5
- ISSN:
- 0036-8326
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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This phenomenological study (Moustakas, 1994) explores the mentoring needs of 11 engineering postdoctoral scholars of color with an adaptation of the ideal mentoring model (Zambrana et al., 2015) used as the conceptual framework. A critical theory lens (Morrow & Brown, 1994) is applied to Moustakas’ (1994) four-stage process of phenomenological data analysis to examine the interview data: epoché, horizontalization, imaginative variation, and synthesis. The essence of the phenomenon is engineering postdoctoral scholars of color have primary and secondary mentoring needs pertaining to their immediate career acquisition of a tenure-track faculty position. Primary mentoring needs include expanding professional networks for the tenure-track faculty job search and receiving guidance on work-life balance and enhancing technical skills. Secondary needs consist of refining research directions and research expertise promotion, as well as acquiring political guidance on matters of race/ethnicity in academia. These findings reveal the importance of higher education institutions and postdoctoral supervisors assuming greater responsibility for ensuring postdoctoral scholars receive the mentorship and career support they desire, which may require a systematic change in the postdoctoral training environment.more » « less
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1002/sce.21755
