Faculty Mentoring

Why is Faculty Mentoring Important? Mentoring can provide a myriad of benefits to faculty that address both psychosocial and professional needs. According to NCFDDformal and informal mentoring can provide:

  • Feedback;
  • Sponsorship and access to opportunities;
  • Accountability and professional development for career success;
  • Emotional support;
  • A sense of intellectual community; and 
  • Role models.

These needs cannot necessarily be satisfied by a single mentoring experience, but might be informally or formally provided a range of supports, including formal mentoring groups, informal mentoring from department or professional colleagues, and support from friends, family, and the broader community in which faculty live and work. 

NDSU aims to provide several avenues of formal support for new and advanced faculty. The following mentoring and advancement opportunities are available:

The Faculty Advancement Mentoring Network (FAMN) provides cross-disciplinary mentoring support for new and junior faculty, who are matched in small groups with experienced faculty mentors at the beginning of the academic year. 

  • Who is FAMN for? Any faculty member, in any discipline, in any rank/position at NDSU who has been at NDSU between 0-5 years. 
  • How can I get involved?  Contact Julie Nash for more information.  

Mentoring and Networking for New Faculty is focused on early career faculty and is provided by our Faculty Affairs office, Research and Creative Activity and the Office of Teaching and Learning. For more information on those sessions, dates, and registration links, visit the new faculty page.

NCFDD is an organization that provides faculty with online tools and resources for ongoing professional development. Some of the benefits provided with the NCFDD membership include online discussion boards, 14-day online writing challenges, and on-demand webinars providing guidance on writing and research productivity, time and stress management, and prioritizing and planning work.

NDSU General Resources

Key Information and Resources for Faculty: This website contains links to important information and resources for faculty at NDSU. Consider it your “one stop shop” for general questions about teaching, advising, research, policies, development, IT, and more. 

Mentoring Resources

Best Practices for Mentors and Mentees in Academic Settings (from Michigan State University): This website provides guidance for both mentors and mentees about how to create and sustain productive mentoring relationships. Includes specific actions that can be taken by both mentors and mentees. 

Tips for Mentees (from American Psychological Association): Describes responsibilities and characteristics of successful mentees.

Tips for Mentors (from American Psychological Association): Describes responsibilities and characteristics of successful mentors. 

The Value of Mentoring (from Experience Life): Describes responsibilities and expectations for establishing successful mentoring relationships, as a mentor. 

Top 10 Tips for Mentors (from Science): Describes some of the most meaningful behaviors of successful mentors. 

Five Relational Strategies for Mentoring Female Faculty (from Adultspan Journal): Describes five evidence-based strategies for providing effective mentoring support for faculty who identify as female (see pp. 7-13). 

How to Give Better Advice (from Scientific American): A short piece providing a different way of approaching advice giving: Providing information and options, rather than telling someone what to do, is often a more successful strategy, as is perspective-taking. 

Addressing Common Challenges (from OHSU School of Medicine): This site identifies six common challenges that can emerge in mentor-mentee relationships, with strategies for addressing them. 

Writing/Research Productivity Resources

Developing a Master Scholarship Plan (from Inside Higher Ed): Describes one strategy to get past feeling “stuck” on writing/projects by creating a master plan. 

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