Mentor and Mother Hen: Just What I Needed as a First Year Professor

Abstract

Support is needed for new faculty members to achieve success in the early stages of the higher education career. Women, in particular, are often left to fend for themselves when entering the academy. This sonata-form case study glimpse into a mentoring relationship will focus on the experience of a new female faculty member as she was mentored and "mother-henned" by a senior member in her department. The mentor provided the framework for open sharing about tenure and promotion expectations, the inside politics of the department, research protocols at the university, and many other supports that led to her early success in academia. A point of interest is the fact that this was a cross-race mentoring relationship.