—-In Progress (1/20/2022)—-

My mentorship philosophy is centered on 5 core values. They are outlined and described below.

• intentionality

• identity, authenticity, and values

• positivity and empowerment

• clear and effective communication

• personal growth, reflection, and mutual feedback

Identity

Science and scientists are fundamentally human at their core, and humans contain multitudes. I believe it is critical to recognize, appreciate, and empower the identities we hold and the way they intersect with each other and our work.

What does this look like in practice?

• Representation matters.

  As such, I build mentor-mentee relationships with folks that come from many different backgrounds and hold many identities (often intersecting and non-dissociable). I strongly believe this is the best way to do science for several reasons. Namely, diverse lab/institutional environments are most likely to manifest:

  • rich ideas and high-quality science

  • findings that represent the people we serve

  • a more diverse scientific landscape in the future (i.e., a better take on the Matthew effect)

  There is plenty of evidence to suggest people are more likely to believe they can achieve their goals if they see people who look (and think) like them doing the same. I also think “representation matters” in the way that it is important for members of dominant groups to witness people who don’t look like them showcasing the things we are all impressed by: thoughtful and sound experiments, meaningful results, and creative thinking.

  Yet, at most institutions, scientists - especially at the senior level - are not representative of the larger population (or even of their trainees). We have abundant evidence that aptitude is not the driver of this discrepancy in representation - in fact, entire bodies of literature support my personal observations that members of marginalized groups are just as (sometimes more) adept compared to those with non-marginalized identities.

  I believe that diversity among scientists (especially at the senior level) brings about more thoughtful and innovative science, results in a more dynamic workplace, and organically creates a more robust network of mentored opportunities for trainees and colleagues. However, so far in my career, senior scientists who have mentored me occupy a more limited spectrum of identities than those I have mentored. To me, this is a weakness in my own training (and a weakness that I am explicit/honest about with formal mentees). In addition to advocating for the hiring and institutional support of a more diverse faculty body, I am constantly working to remedy this weakness by expanding my own network of mentors. I also actively empower my mentees to be intentional about building their own networks of trusted advisors.

• I expect that my identities and those of my mentors/mentees influence our ability to meaningfully engage in our work.

  • Often this has positive implications for our work.

    I have frequently observed my own background and experiences improving the quality and creativity of my work. It’s hard to anticipate and plan for this to happen, but I trust and feel empowered that it does and will continue to. I am confident that without the multidimensional path that I’ve taken, the science I have done to date would be of lower quality.

    I believe - and have witnessed - the same to be true of my mentees (and occasionally of mentors). This might occur in direct ways - for example, a mentee from an underfunded public school conceptualizes a more efficient, cheaper way to build a tool we need in the lab based on a physics project they did in high school. It might also occur in subtle, indirect ways - for example, a Ghanaian mentee is nervous about their first poster presentation and the first visitor to their poster is a colleague with a pin of the Ghanaian flag on their backpack, which inspires confidence, a sense of belonging and community, and plants the seed for a new collaboration.

  • Sometimes this presents barriers to our success.

    As a mentee, I believe it’s important to communicate with my mentors, to advocate for myself, and to set up a mentorship network that understands and is empathetic to potential barriers to my success. As a mentor, I believe it’s important to proactively consider and mitigate these barriers to the fullest extent possible within mentee-mentor relationships and at the level of larger systems.

    Sometimes, it’s impossible to predict (for ourselves and for others) how our identities might influence our work. Sometimes this means means our hearts (and minds) are elsewhere and our ability to focus is more limited. It might mean that certain environments feel unfamiliar or uncomfortable. Sometimes it means attending a protest instead of being in lab. Or maybe that we have consistent external demands of our time at specific times of day. Or that our paychecks are distributed to our families. Or institutional reimbursement mechanisms or family obligations impose on our flexibility to attend a conference. Or that our opportunities for career advancement feel restricted by geographical or socioeconomic priorities. Or other things I haven’t considered because of my own blindspots.

  • Who we are is fundamentally a part of the work we do. As a mentor, I believe it is important to bring out the best in my trainees by helping them thrive precisely because of their unique identities, rather than in spite of them. Similarly, I have also mentored students and trainees who have not previously considered identity as a part of the way they conduct their work. It is important to me to create environments that encourage all of us to learn and reflect on our identities and how they operate in the context of science. I understand this process to be uncomfortable at times, but vital to what I hope science will look like in the future. Bluntly, I expect that no mentor or mentee I have - including (especially) white or male or other dominant identities - may operate under the premise that we leave identity at the door when conducting science.

• the way we think about and approach research

• the research questions we’re most interested in

Who am I?

Here are a few of my identities!