As part of the YUFE Pilot on Doctoral Learning at the University of Antwerp, the Antwerp Doctoral School is piloting a non-academic mentoring programme for doctoral researchers from September 2024 until June 2025.
The pilot of this non-academic mentoring programme aims to foster career and personal development support for doctoral researchers.
Objectives
Mentoring is a voluntary learning relationship that offers personal development for the mentee.
(Quinn, J., Mentoring: progressing women's careers in Higher Education)
- An opportunity to learn new skills through an informal, trusting and feedback-friendly mentoring relationship;
- An opportunity to get an insight into a non-academic working environment and culture and develop a clearer view of a possible future career path;
- To provide a fresh perspective and guidance from a non-academic point of view;
- To facilitate organisational learning and networking.
Becoming a mentor
Are you an enthusiastic and experienced individual who would like to help a doctoral researcher grow, provide advice and guidance on personal and career development?
Would you like to build an authentic and trusting mentoring relationship with someone to share your knowledge and experience?
Do you want to expand your network and get to know young international researchers from across different science fields, improve your coaching skills and reflect on your own professional path and career?
Apply as a mentor until 28 July 2024.
Who can become a mentor?
- You have a mentoring mindset (you are a good listener, are willing to learn, open to improving your coaching skills, you know how to use the essential soft skills for effective leadership, …);
- You are willing to devote time to develop a trusting relationship with your mentee;
- You are willing to share your experience regarding career questions;
- You currently work in a non-academic environment;
- You preferably have obtained a PhD (in any science field);
- You have no hierarchical relationship with the mentee.
Know that participation will be dependent on finding a suitable match with a mentee.
You can apply as a mentor until 28 July 2024.
Set-up of the programme
We have ca. 30 doctoral researchers from across all science fields (computer science, philosophy, sociology, architecture, law, (bioscience) engineering, (bio)medical science, business and economics, veterinary science, design science, , …) who are currently looking for a mentor.
This mentoring programme is mentee-driven, which means that the mentee will reach out to you for a first contact, is responsible for their goal-setting as well as for taking initiative for all the future interactions and the frequency of those interactions.
As a mentor you can apply from May until 28 July 2024 via this form. One of our mentees will contact you in the course of June or July to see if there could be a match between you and the mentee.
We are looking for intrinsically motivated mentors to ensure a trusting relationship with the mentee. Therefore we do not provide a participation compensation.
Timeline
- Application period for mentors: May/June/July 2024
- Selection: June/July 2024
- Meet & Greet with mentors and mentees: end of September 2024
- Start trajectory: September 2024
- End trajectory: June 2025
- Closing event: June 2025