The goal of the ARA Faculty Mentoring Program is to enhance the ability of early career faculty to successfully navigate the challenges of academe. To this end, the ARA program will promote team mentoring of assistant professors within CNAS, UC-system, and near-peer mentors to enhance faculty success, self-efficacy, advancement, and retention. Combined with the ARA program professional development workshops, the ARA Program’s team mentoring approach will allow junior faculty to develop key competencies and career development strategies to promote their own success. ARA program initiatives should enhance early career faculty self-efficacy and satisfaction and thereby promoting professional success and retention at UCR.
Each year ARA mentees will be selected and paired with a trained UCR mentor (from a different home department) and a non-UCR mentor from another UC campus (aligned with their research area). Each ARA Mentee will receive travel funds to facilitate the mentee/non-UCR mentor relationship and promote the ARA Mentee’s professional development.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Who is eligible?
ARA mentees will be:
- Tenure-track faculty in the Professorial title series including Professors of Teaching, Extension, and Research and other Senate title equivalents within CNAS.
- Pre-tenure faculty. Those who are at least two years away from submitting their tenure file are highly encouraged to apply.
- Faculty who have demonstrated a commitment to equity, diversity and inclusion.
- Underrepresented faculty, including underrepresented minorities (Black/African American, Hispanic/Latinx, Native American), women, and members of the LGBTQ+ community are strongly encouraged to apply.
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How do I apply?
In the winter/early spring all CNAS assistant faculty will receive an email inviting them to apply. Interested applicants will fill out a google form that requests the following information:
General Personal Information
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Name
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Department
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Month and year that you joined UCR
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Expected year for filing tenure (Note: COVID and other ‘stop-the-clock’ actions may extend the period of time from appointment to submission of a tenure file.)
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Provide a short synopsis (250 words) of your research program
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Demographic Information (Optional)
Short Answer Questions
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What are your Mentorship goals? What do you hope to gain or learn? (~400 words or less)
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Challenges: What are some challenges you have faced that have impacted your confidence in being able to succeed at UCR. These can be issues faced at any stage in your academic career (i.e. graduate school, post-doc) that have impacted or may impact your path to tenure or issues that you are currently facing as a faculty member. (~400 words or less)
Mentee Preferences
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What would you like your mentor to know about you?
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What qualities are you looking for in a mentor? This is an opportunity for you to identify qualities such as career stage, personality traits, or affinity preferences of your mentor
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Identify potential UCR Mentors: List up to three UCR faculty members from a STEM field outside your own department whom you believe would be effective faculty career mentors. Faculty can be from CNAS, BCOE, SOM, CHASS, or SOE. (not a required question)
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Identify potential non-UCR Mentors: List up to three UC faculty members from a STEM field outside of UCR, but associated with a UC campus, whom you believe would be effective faculty research mentors. (not a required question)
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Current mentors: Who are your current formal and informal mentors at UCR or at other institutions? As the ARA program seeks to complement other mentoring initiatives, this information will be used to find an ARA mentor.
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How are mentees selected?
Mentees will be selected based on eligibility and availability of appropriate mentors.
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Who is eligible to be a mentor?
ARA Mentors can be faculty:
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in the associate and full ranks of professorial title series including Professors of Teaching, Extension, and Research and other Senate title equivalents within CNAS.
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who will participate in the ARA Mentor Training Workshops.
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who have a commitment to mentoring and enabling the success of others.
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interested in sharing mentoring lessons and tips and helping to build a CNAS mentoring community.
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who have a commitment to equity, diversity and inclusion.
Faculty belonging to groups from historically marginalized communities are strongly encouraged to apply.
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How are mentors selected?
Mentors will be selected based on eligibility and "match" with the needs of an ARA mentee. After selection, ARA mentees will have the opportunity to read through mentor bios and CVs and rank their top choices. Final matching will be based on mentor and mentee preferences, mentor rankings, and mentee goals. We will make every effort to match mentees with one of their top choices.
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How do mentors apply?
A call for mentors to apply will be sent out in winter/early spring quarter at the same time as mentee applications. Mentors will be asked to provide the following information:
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A short synopsis of your research program. (~250 words)
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CV
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Why are you interested in being an ARA mentor? As mentoring is a two-way conversation, what do you hope to gain or learn from being an ARA mentor? (no more than ~400 words)
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What is your experience in mentoring faculty? Who are your current formal and informal mentees at UCR (indicate Dept)? at other institutions? The ARA program seeks to complement other mentoring initiatives on campus; this information will be used to find an ARA mentee. Please note previous experience being a faculty mentor is not essential for becoming an ARA mentor. (no more than ~400 words)
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Applicants are asked to rank Which of the following they feel most comfortable providing mentorship on?
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Publishing
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Merit & tenure review
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Getting Grants
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Mentoring students & trainees
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Advancing inclusion, diversity, equity & belonging
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Navigating departmental politics
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Making professional contacts
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Managing negotiations or conflicts
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Leadership
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Teaching
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Campus Administration
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