September 5, 2024

Cornell’s Faculty Advancing Inclusive Mentoring (FAIM) team is putting tools in the hands of faculty and graduate students to help them create better mentoring relationships. Recent updates to National Science Foundation (NSF) guidelines require more comprehensive mentoring and individual development plans (IDPs) for graduate students and postdoctoral researchers, and the Cornell FAIM leadership team is stepping up to this challenge by providing faculty with the necessary training materials and resources they need.

The FAIM framework and resource center is part of the institutionalization of Cornell’s engagement in the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation-funded Equity in Graduate Education (EGE) Consortium launched nationally in 2022 and led by Julie Posselt at the University of Southern California. The EGE Consortium brings together change-ready universities, graduate programs, and academic leaders to align policies and practices with commitments to equity-based systemic change in graduate education.

The Cornell EGE team, led by Graduate School Associate Dean for Inclusion and Student and Faculty Engagement Sara Xayarath Hernández and Associate Dean for Professional Development Colleen McLinn, includes leadership from the Provost’s Office for Faculty Development and Diversity and six academic units: the departments of communication, computer science, molecular biology and genetics, and earth and atmospheric sciences; the graduate field of biomedical and biological sciences; and the School of Integrative Plant Sciences.

FAIM provides faculty with a philosophy and key principles for inclusive mentoring in graduate education and the professoriate. It also offers core mutual expectations for faculty mentors and graduate student mentees, a practical toolkit for mentoring in graduate education, and ongoing learning opportunities for both mentors and mentees.

To support faculty in fulfilling NSF’s new proposal requirements for graduate student mentoring and individual development plans are tools and resources made accessible through the Cornell FAIM Resource Center. Guidance for meeting the new NSF requirements is available on the Research Services website, along with clear explanations of the changes in NSF proposal requirements and definitions. A template for creating mentoring plans for sponsored projects and access to IDP tools are accessible via the FAIM Practical Toolkit for Mentoring in Graduate Education.

Faculty from various fields of study have found Cornell’s partnership with the EGE Consortium and support of the Cornell FAIM leadership team helpful.

“There is strong motivation in my department to use the latest research-informed best practices for recruiting and mentoring graduate students,” said Matt Pritchard, professor, director of the Institute for the Study of the Continents, and former director of graduate studies for the field of geological sciences. “The EGE Consortium provides this and gives space to learn from other practitioners across campus and the country.”

“Graduate education is a significant investment for all involved, and so it is important that we do it well by using evidence-based practices for recruiting and mentoring graduate students,” he continued.

“Our engagement in the EGE Consortium and with the Cornell FAIM leadership team provides a community where we can have open conversations to help us make our own decisions as we work to increase the equity of our programs,” said Jean-Luc Jannink, adjunct professor in the plant breeding and genetics section of the School of Integrative Plant Science. “Even in the secluded halls of academia, we have a role to play in bending the arc of history toward racial justice, and our work can ripple out in unique ways.”