The first cohort of mid-career faculty members completed an innovative, six-month course in mentoring as part of the Mentor Development Program (MDP) sponsored by the Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI) and the Faculty Mentoring Program at UCSF.
Eighteen participants, representing all four UCSF professional schools, recently graduated from the new MDP during National Mentoring Month.
Applications are now being accepted for the next cohort session beginning in February 2008. Mid-level and early senior faculty who are dedicated to clinical and translational research are invited to apply for participation in the MDP.
"We are the first and only MDP that is part of a CTSI in the country," said Jeanette S. Brown, MD, director of the Comprehensive Mentoring Program, which includes the MDP and the Junior Faculty Mentoring Program.
The CTSI at UCSF is one of the first 12 academic institutions selected to be part of the National Institutes of Health's clinical and translational science consortium. The consortium has a charter to transform clinical and translational research to ensure that the best health solutions get to patients as quickly as possible. At UCSF, CTSI is a cross-campus institute, with scientist leaders at its helm.
'Natural Evolution'
The Comprehensive Mentoring Program is a joint venture of the CTSI and the UCSF Faculty Mentoring Program, which is directed by Mitchell Feldman, MD, professor of medicine. Responding to the results from the Faculty Climate Survey, the UCSF Faculty Mentoring Program was established in 2006 with the goals of supporting the recruitment and retention of the highest-quality faculty, increasing faculty diversity through improved mentoring of underrepresented faculty, and improving faculty career satisfaction and success, according to Feldman.
Feldman, Brown and representatives from the schools of dentistry, medicine, nursing and pharmacy, who served as assistant directors, helped develop the MDP's curriculum for mid-level faculty who are expected to become the next generation of confident, effective clinical and translational mentors.
"I feel better prepared and better empowered to serve as a mentor," said Leslee Subak, MD, upon graduating from the MDP in a lunchtime ceremony on Jan. 17.
For Subak, who started her residency in 1991 and joined the faculty at UCSF in 1997, the desire to mentor her junior-level faculty research colleagues "is a natural evolution" of her health sciences career at UCSF.
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Jeanette S. Brown, director of the Comprehensive Mentoring Program, congratulates Leslee Subak, who recently graduated as part of the first class of mid-career research faculty mentors. |
"Initially, you focus on getting grant funding and advancing your research program, but you get to the point when you really want and need to reach out to others and help them along to advance their skills to be better able to become successful independent investigators," Subak said.
An obstetrician/
gynecologist with a specialty in urogynecology and pelvic surgery at the UCSF Women's Continence Center, Subak focuses her research on studying the correlation of urinary incontinence and obesity as well as the cost-effectiveness of treating urinary incontinence. She said that while the MDP brought together faculty with diverse research backgrounds, the program reinforced in her mind the exceptional quality of the faculty and research endeavors at UCSF.
"I also was struck by the commonality of our experiences at UCSF and the fact that we really have so much we can learn from each other," Subak said.
Supporting Mentors
Subak is also among the few at UCSF who have received financial support from the National Institutes of Health's K24 award, which offers support for mid-career mentoring in patient-oriented research. She attributes her successful grant application to participation in the MDP.
The MDP created an integrated environment for senior mentors and mentors-in-training, encouraging creative and innovative networking, discussing a range of mentoring challenges and a myriad of solutions, developing a toolbox of strategies, and using discussions and collective experiences to build a community of mentoring excellence.
One key to the MDP's success in fostering an ongoing dialogue among busy research faculty was the creation and use of an MDP wiki by the CTSI Virtual Home. The MDP wiki is web-based information-sharing software that allows program organizers to post seminars and mentoring cases, and allows participants to share their comments about mentoring strategies.
Developing effective mentoring programs is one way UCSF is working to promote a supportive work environment, one of seven strategic priorities in the UCSF Strategic Plan. That plan, unveiled last year, states that "mentoring programs should be expanded and made available to all, including staff, students and trainees."
The Faculty Mentoring Program is designed to complement existing mentoring programs at UCSF and ensure that all new and junior faculty are paired with a career mentor.
Photo/Lisa Cisneros
Related Links:
CTSI Comprehensive Mentoring Program
Faculty Mentoring Program
Mentorship Across the Campus, UCSF
