MentorNet's Signature Program:
One-on-One E-Mentoring
Despite some progress, women and people of color remain severely underrepresented in the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields. Research has shown that mentoring, along with advising and research experiences, is an important predictor of academic persistence and success for women in engineering and, by extension, underrepresented groups in other STEM fields.1 However, women and minorities too often find themselves in environments where the opportunities for mentoring are insufficient for their needs.
To meet these needs, MentorNet offers a formal, structured email-based mentoring program for women and others underrepresented in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. The primary objective of these mentoring relationships is to encourage protégés to pursue their interests in the STEM fields by completing their degrees and entering the workforce.
Participation in the One-on-One E-Mentoring Program is currently restricted to protégés who are affiliated with an institution of higher education that is a participating partner organization, or a dues-paying member of a sponsoring professional society (for example, the Society of Women Engineers). MentorNet had more than 100 campus partners in 2007, as seen in the chart below. Note that all partnering campuses were required to pay an annual fee beginning in 2002-03.
Protégés can be undergraduate students at community colleges or four-year colleges, graduate masters or doctoral students, postdoctoral scholars, or early-career faculty members. For the 2006-07 year, the vast majority of protégés were undergraduates, as shown in the chart below. In fact, 40% of protégés were first and second year undergraduates at four-year institutions.
Mentors can be female or male professionals with educational or work experience in engineering and the related sciences who are employed in industry, government agencies and laboratories, higher education, or the nonprofit sector. MentorNet mentors are employed by more than 1,000 different organizations. During 2006-07, approximately 70% of mentors worked in industry, as seen in the chart below:
The MentorNet web site provides a mentor’s guide, a protégé’s guide, and interactive training tutorials. Participants are encouraged to familiarize themselves with these materials at the onset of the program. For the professionals who will serve as mentors, the web site includes general information about protégés’ campuses; it also includes information about the corporate, government agency, and professional society partners for the protégés.
1Knight, M. T., & Cunningham, C. M. (2004). Building a structure of support: An inside look at the structure of women in engineering programs. Journal of Women and Minorities in Science and Engineering, 10(1), 1-20.
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