Your Relationship With Mentees: Students Dealing With Students

by Ryan Leib

Life always has its chores. As a youth,you probably took out the garbage or mowed the lawn. In college,maybe you bussed tables or shelved books in the library. You didn’t really think grad school would be different,did you? If you’re like most of the graduate students on our campus,you find yourself teaching a course that you hardly paid attention to a few years ago during your own undergraduate career. Between obligations to your research project,your post-doctoral (or other degree) plans,and your social life,it’s often hard to find the time to prep for that freshman lab course,but your students will never know,right? The problem is that most of us (excluding the oh-so-lucky education students!) have little formal training on how best to pass on our wisdom to the next generation. In fact,you probably fall into one of these archetypal categories of GSI:

The Puppeteer
You don’t see teaching as educational so much as a quest for control. Sure,you have your favorite student or two who you can trust,but most of them need to be ‘managed’. You spend most your time turning your students against each other,setting up in- class competitions and publicly posting grades. Whenever possible,you avoid interacting with the students directly,and instead choose to send mass emails and hang handwritten signs next to the whiteboard.

The Doorstop
Instructing your students is an addendum to an afterthought. You are so busy with other things
that you find yourself looking over the day’s material for the first time with an Expo marker in your hand. You hit the high points,but most of the class period feels wasted as you turn pages and say “Um” with alarming frequency. You know only a couple of their faces and none of their names – but “hey you” seems to work thus far.

The Milquetoast
Your students don’t need to learn, or work, or frankly even show up.No one quite remembers
the last time they studied for your class. You have office hours from 9-5,and bring the coffee
and doughnuts. Assignments are more of a motivational exercise,and tests should be less about
grades and more about feeling comfortable. Sure,your students don’t respect you,but they
invite you to parties on the weekends.

The Over-Analyzer
You live to teach. You read every book, review every article,attend every seminar – all in the interest of your students’ education. Unfortunately, that means you’re on the outs with your girl,
your PI is still waiting for that presentation outline,and you own class work is in the toilet. When you teach, you spend more time polling the class for ways to improve or change things up
than covering the real material.

Hopefully none of these describes you perfectly. However, not unlike those ridiculous horoscopes you read in the checkout line, there’s probably a nugget of truth in some of them (and as an added benefit/horror, they probably serve as an interesting window into my psyche,which is something I typically would like to keep closed with shades drawn). Regardless of how your personal style seems to be working out thus far, here are some handy ways to keep ahead of the curve, or at least one chapter ahead of that smart kid who sits up front.

People learn differently. No, it’s true. Since you’re a graduate student, it may not be obvious why those basic concepts that came easily for you are not getting through to your freshman. The important thing to remember is that what comes easily for some can be a real bear for others. Try mixing things up a bit,and always have a couple extra angles to approach hard subjects. This is especially helpful during those office hour sessions you should be holding (and plugging during class) to help your students stay on top of things.

It’s a part time job. As much as you’d like to slack off (or learn all there is to know about your subject), most GSIs are being paid for a 20 hour work week. Those 20 hours includes attending class sessions, grading papers and reports,holding office hours and studying up on how to be a better GSI. Spending too much less or too much more,and both you and your beloved students will suffer for it. Sure, sometimes there are light (or heavy) weeks, but the hope is that you’re still advancing towards your academic goals while helping your students meet theirs.

Have a plan. A few minutes of prep can make any interaction with your students go that much more smoothly. Know what general issues have been discussed during the last few class periods,and what likely stumbling blocks are in the new material. Make sure you can work through any assigned homework before you assign it. As far as prepping for lectures,the author has found that using notecards to plan your chalkboard layout (in scale format,no less!) does wonders.

Get feedback. If you’re not sure how you rate as a GSI, try asking. Find some students whose opinions you trust,and ask them what kinds of things you could do to improve. Alternatively,ask some of your fellow grad students to sit in on your lecture and see if they can pass along any pointers. If neither of these are a good option, you can always videotape yourself giving a lecture,and then see what you think. It’s always easier to see a problem from an objective (or approximately objective) point of view.

Students are students - not friends (nor enemies) Face it, you will like some students better than others. Maybe you’ll have common interests,or maybe they’re more charming than their compatriots. Alternatively, you might have a student who never has a good question and you feel like every minute you spend on them is wasted. Whatever the issue, you have an ethical obligation to be fair to your students. This doesn’t mean doing their work for them (that’s unethical too!) but try to be available and equitable. Maybe, after the class is over, you’ll find time to befriend some of your students,but while the grades are being assigned, aim to keep things on an instructor-student basis.

You’re not alone Almost ten thousand graduate students currently attend Cal, and many of them have teaching questions (and problems) like you do. Luckily, in addition to departmental training assistance, the GSI Teaching and Resource Center provides funding, seminars, and a whole library on the subject of being a better instructor. For details on new resources and upcoming events, see their website at gsi.berkeley.edu. Oh,and the last 15 minutes you spent reading this totally count towards this week’s 20 hours.

Your Relationship With Mentors: Notes From the Winners Circle

With thanks to the DFMA Committee

The Graduate Assembly this last year gave out its 4th annual Distinguished Faculty
Mentors Award, honoring Senate and Non-Senate members of the Berkeley faculty who
have shown an outstanding commitment to developing and supporting graduate student
researchers. These were individuals who had gone above and beyond the call of duty
with respect to helping graduate students become outstanding scholars.

Not every department apparently has mentors,however for those of you who do,it is
nice to see what is out there. Perhaps one day you too will be a mentor and you’d like
to know what people beside you really appreciate or what keeps them getting up and
going to work every day. So we went through some of the nominations that led to
wins to see what people were saying about folks here on campus.

“A mentor might be supportive in guidance of students’ academic achievement, but a great mentor inspires students to explore their own interests,to understand the benefit of discipline, to keep a good balance between school and personal life, and to devote to their own belief.“

“Significant amount of research labs have a set plan to follow, and new graduate students are incorporated into the plan. Their own interests often become blurry in transition, and their efforts are spent just for the degree. This has never happened.”

“Our lab is like a big family—we share the excitement of research achieving, and we share the glorious moment of everyone’s graduation including undergraduate students.”

“As a dedicated instructor,mentor,and advisor,he has always helped us in our efforts in academic achievement and in the larger professional world of scholarly publishing and research.“

“He has taught us the academic expectations of professionals in the field as well as the appropriate conduct necessary to working with academics outside of UC Berkeley in the kind of detail and care that goes well beyond the requirements of his job as an advisor and professor.His advice and guidance with course work and research has been consistently intelligent, thorough, helpful, and prompt, and he has been regularly available,even while away on sabbatical. In a profession in which generosity is not always a rule,this has been a characteristic of his dedication to his students.We know first hand that when he says students are his work,and not just the research all scholars engage in,it is a lived truth in his case.Considering the type of attention he devotes to his students as well as to his colleagues in the field,what is surprising is that on top of this,he has had time to write very influential books and articles that have marked important trends in the profession.“

“A careful and patient listener,he demonstrated a keen ability to divine constructive future steps.”

“…Very insightful about the complex relationships between people in different institutions
and their patterns of thought they bring to their work.Because of this he is able to help
students with a very wide range of research and career interests,providing both connec-
tions to different approaches and critical reflection on research methods.In addition he
understands that students come to graduate school with a very wide range of professional
goals,and he is able to both help them structure their program to meet those goals,as well
as to reflect on them and often to change them.”

“…Offers inspiration as well as support.His passion for justice and his passion for scholarship are inseparable;he has demonstrated in countless ways that there is no contradiction between engagement in social issues and uncompromising excellence in research. He does this without the pretense that scholarship does not embody values, but rather challenges his students and colleagues to be reflexive about the ways in which their values do influence research (and other people’s values influences their research,whether they admit it or not).”

“Though he is forever tempting us with new ideas,warning us of unforeseen difficulties, and
often seems to somehow know the direction our work will take before we do, he is also
clearly committed to cultivating our independence as scholars.”

“Guided by his experiences and challenged by his questions,we find ourselves wanting to strikeout in new directions or to look at old problems in a different light.“