Purpose
To document the frequency of policies and activities in support of mentoring practices at institutions receiving a U.S. National Institutes of Health’s Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA).
Method
The study consisted of a 69-item survey with questions about the inclusion (formal or informal) of policies, programs/activities and structures supporting mentoring within CTSA-sponsored research (i.e., KL2 programs) and, more broadly, in the CTSA’s home institution. The survey, conducted from November 2010 through January 2011, was sent to the 55 institutions awarded a CTSA at the time of the survey. Follow-up phone interviews were conducted to clarify responses as needed.
Results
Fifty-one of 55 (92%) institutions completed the survey for institutional programs and 53 of 55 (96%) for KL2 programs. Responses regarding policies and activities involving mentor criteria, mentor–mentee relationship, incentives, and evaluative mechanisms revealed considerable variability between KL2 and institutional programs in some areas, such as having mentor qualification criteria and processes to evaluate mentors The survey also identified areas, such as training and women and minority mentoring programs, where there was frequent sharing of activities between the institutional and KL2 programs.
Conclusions
KL2 programs and institutional programs tend to have different preferences for policies versus activities to optimize qualification of mentors, the mentor–mentee relationship, incentives and evaluation mechanisms. Frequently, these elements are informal. Individuals in charge of implementing and maintaining mentoring initiatives can use the results of the study to consider their current mentoring policies, structures, and activities by comparing them to national patterns within CTSA institutions.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.