Welcome to our Online Mentoring program-2019!

We are thrilled to announce the third offering of this program! It was piloted in 2017 and a second round happened in 2018. The program provides professional mentoring to PhD students and postdoctoral scientists, as well as opportunities for alumni to reconnect with fellow peers.

Mentoring Roster 2019

Program Overview

In today’s workforce biomedical PhDs are employed within a variety of fields including: biotechnology, communications, consulting, intellectual property law and science policy—to name a few! It’s a transformative time for scientific training and UC Irvine embraces diverse career paths by inviting PhD and Postdoctoral alumni back to campus to inspire the next generation of scientists.

Since the beginning of the GPS-BIOMED program in 2014, many PhD students and postdocs have been trained through our program and now located in diverse job sectors locally and nationally. We aim to recruit alumni holding diverse positions who are willing to give their time, knowledge and expertise to mentor current UCI trainees. We believe our program will increase career awareness as well as create a community where not only current trainees, but also alumni can expand their networks.

Program Mission

Our mission is to better prepare UCI scientists for a variety of careers, and empower them to become not only skilled researchers, but also polished professionals.

Program Goals

Our scientists undergo excellent research training but often lack exposure to diverse industries and external mentorship, which are essential components of successful career transitions. To address this gap, our mentorship program pairs current trainees with UCI graduate and postdoctoral alumni working in a variety of fields. Additionally, the mentors do not have to be UCI graduates, we have kept the platform open to anyone who would like to mentor our trainees. If you are one of those, we welcome you and thank you sincerely in participating.

The program is designed to meet the following goals:

1. Increase awareness of career paths available to PhD’s
2. Build a supportive community where mentors and mentees can openly discuss career advancement and preparedness
3. Expand networks for both trainees and alumni

Program Format and Duration – Online!

This program will run for 3 months. The format is intended to help participants connect and build mentor-mentee relationships. Given the schedule conflicts and wide geographical distribution of our alumni, this year, we are taking the program online! This will give our trainees the opportunity to be mentored by professionals who are employed nationally in different job sectors.

At the end of the 3 month period, we will try to bring all the mentors together on UCI’s Campus to meet their mentees in real-time and connect/network with their peer mentors.

Time Commitment from Prospective Mentors (Alumni or non-alumni)

The time commitment required from mentors will range from 30 minutes/month to 2 hours/month, depending on their schedule and time. The online platform meetings will ensure that mentors or mentees do not have to travel to participate in mentoring program. The mentoring can happen from any location, any device (computer, phone) and can be arranged anytime based on mentor’s time schedule.

Interested in serving as Mentor for year 2019? Please sign up here and we will get in touch with more details.

Requirements from Prospective Mentees*

We want prospective mentees to be very mindful of mentor’s time and therefore we will only allow the highly trained and dedicated trainees who are ready to transition to participate in the program. Thus, we will be stringent in selecting trainees to ensure efficient and specific mentoring. Registration steps for Trainees to participate in the program

If you are a PhD student or Postdoctoral scientist registered as official GPS-BIOMED member and would like to participate in GPS-BIOMED Mentoring program, you will need to:

1. Fill out the registration survey and submit required documents – Mentee Registration Form
2. Read the following best practices for informational interviewing and communications with mentors (You will be provided online training session before beginning of the program).

After you complete the survey and upload required documents, we will send you details on the next steps for preparation session followed by online mentoring meeting.

How does it work?

After the mentors confirm their participation in 2019 Mentoring program and allow us to use their information from LinkedIn profile (photo, job title, organization), we will prepare a Mentoring Network Database categorized into different fields (Medical Affairs, Academic, Science Communication, Industry research, business development – to name a few) to be sent out to prospective mentees. Mentees will be asked to select up to 3 mentors of their choice based on their careers of interest.

After we collect prospective mentee’s responses along with the required documents, we will share the mentee package (4 trainee max) with their corresponding mentor(s) of choice. GPS-BIOMED will do most of the work in categorizing trainee future career choice and matching that with prospective mentor’s current job profile. We will organize introductory online session of mentor with 4 prospective mentees (15 mins max) to help mentors make a decision in selecting the trainee(s) they would like to mentor.  The mentors will have complete freedom select trainees for mentoring.

The final matches will be announced to each mentee and then the next steps will follow:

• Mentors and mentees will be asked to show their availability via scheduling calendar (When2meet) and time duration for first session
• GPS-BIOMED leadership will finalize the meeting and use online Zoom conferencing platform to set up meeting
• Before the actual online meeting, mentees will be given training on etiquettes of online conferencing, basics of communication with the professionals (mentors), cheat sheet of questions to be asked to get maximum out of the mentoring session
• Given we have large number of prospective mentors interested in the program, we would like to stagger the online meetings to make the program manageable for GPS-BIOMED leadership as well as mentors-mentees.
• The first meeting will be organized by GPS-BIOMED after which mentor-mentee dyad will be allowed to share details of communication (LinkedIn messaging, private email, phone) and take the communications forward on their own
• Mentees will be required to inform GPS-BIOMED on how many meetings they have done with their mentors so we can update their PD credits on our records

For more information or to get involved, please contact: Harinder Singh, Ph.D., Harinder.Singh@uci.edu or David Fruman, PhD., dfruman@uci.edu

Frequently Asked Questions from Prospective Mentors:

Recap of past alumni mentoring program

On June 1st 2017, the Alumni Mentor Program for biomedical PhDs kicked off with a networking event at Newkirk Alumni Center. The program was created by Graduate Professional Success in the Biomedical Sciences (GPS-BIOMED), to provide professional mentoring to current trainees as well as a chance for alumni to reconnect with their peers. Through a series of on-campus and online meetings, participants discuss a range of job opportunities and build a community that supports career exploration, transition and advancement.

In past 2 years (2017, 2018), alumni mentoring produced numerous ways for trainees to hone their career interests. Trainees took initiative and organized 1-on-1 meetings with their mentors, shadowed their mentors at their place of work, and attended networking events together.

“I am now aware of possible careers post-PhD, and worked on a career plan with my mentor that emphasized the skills I would need to be successful,” shared a former graduate student participant.

The program was also extremely valuable for alumni with over 70% of mentors indicating that it expanded their professional network and enhanced their mentorship style. The mentoring program will not only be helpful for our trainees but we would like mentors to also benefit from it. We plan to organize online introduction sessions between the mentees to get to know each other and possibly discuss any concerns they have on the program structure and execution. We are always open to suggestions from mentors in making this program more beneficial to both the parties. Additionally, at the end of the the program, we would like to organize on-campus mentor-mentee event, which would serve as not only culmination of the event but also an opportunity to meet mentor-mentees in real-time.

GPS-BIOMED thanks the UCI Graduate Division for supporting the past Alumni Mentor Program by providing alumni mentors willing to give their time, wisdom and expertise.

Alumni Mentor Recruitment

Southern California is a vibrant academic and business community, home to numerous universities and biotechnology companies. We aim to recruit alumni holding diverse positions that are willing to give their time, knowledge and expertise to mentor current UCI trainees. We believe our program will increase career awareness as well as create a community where not only current trainees, but also alumni can expand their networks. Click here to view the roster of our 2018 Alumni Mentors.

Program Goals

Our scientists undergo excellent research training but often lack exposure to diverse industries and external mentorship, which are essential components of successful career transitions. To address this gap, our mentorship program pairs current trainees with UCI graduate and postdoctoral alumni working in a variety of fields. The program is designed to meet the following goals:

1. Increase awareness of career opportunities available to PhD’s
2. Build a supportive community where mentors and mentees can openly discuss career advancement and preparedness
3. Expand networks for both trainees and alumni

Program Structure & Time Commitment

This program will run for 4 months and will include two on-campus breakfast events and one online meeting.* The format is intended to help attendees connect and build mentor-mentee relationships. Alumni mentors and trainees are required to attend the on-campus meetings, and the time commitment for the entire program is estimated to be 12hr.

*Program Schedule-at-a-glance

Program Prep 

Prior to the first meeting on June 1st, trainees will review alumni bios and will participate in a workshop that will cover: program expectations, tips for developing meaningful connections, and fundamentals of professional etiquette. Similarly, alumni will receive material that will provide tips and suggestions for developing a mentoring plan.

Trainee Workshops, Led by Bri McWhorter & Emma Flores-Kim, Tuesday, May 29th, 12 – 1PM, Location: Natural Sciences 2-4201

• This workshop is required for all trainees accepted into the program.

On-campus breakfast #1, Friday, June 1st, 8 – 10AM, Location: UCI Applied Innovation

• 8:00AM: Alumni mentors arrive, get breakfast, and settle in for a brief presentation that will cover: program expectations and strategies to build lasting mentoring relationships.
• 8:30AM: Trainees arrive
• 8:35AM: General welcome & brief opening statements by alumni mentors (Mentor prompt: Why are you here today?)
• 8:45 – 10AM: Meet & greet (Mentors will be stationed at tables, trainees will be free to move around. 10 minute intervals will be announced)

At this first meeting, trainees and alumni will meet and mingle for just over 1hr.  Both groups will be advised to wait until the event ends to establish mentor-mentee pairings. Following the event, trainees will begin reaching out to potential alumni mentors and alumni will reserve the privilege of accepting or declining a mentee. Once pairings are established, mentors and mentees will determine subsequent activities—e.g. in-person meetings, shadowing, networking events, book clubs, etc.

Online Meeting, Exact date/time: TBD

This online meeting will feature a new platform developed by the UCI Alumni Association. It will provide a scheduled time for mentors and mentees to check in, review mentoring plans, and continue to get to know one another. More details about the online platform will be provided to all members in the coming months.

On-campus breakfast #2, Friday, September 14th, 8 – 10AM, Location: UCI Applied Innovation

• 8:00AM: Members arrive, get breakfast, and mingle
• 8:30AM: General welcome & brief opening statements by trainees (Trainee prompt: What have you gained from this experience?)
• 8:45 – 9:30AM: Mentor-mentee pair meetings
• 9:30 – 10AM: Free networking & mingling

This final meeting will provide a scheduled time for mentors and mentees to check in and discuss lessons learned and recommended future steps.

Evaluation & Sustainability

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Thanks for your attention and making it this far! If you are interested in becoming an alumni mentor, please contact: Emma Flores, Ph.D. (Previous Associate Director, GPS-BIOMED)