Categories: Identify and Schedule a Trainer | Engage Your Participants | Prepare Your Resources | Train Mentors and Mentees | Launch Internships | Establish Internship Opportunities
Identify and Schedule a Trainer
Recommended Timeline: 6 months before mentorship launch
Hiring a professional to guide the students and mentors in developing shared understandings of BIPOC experiences in LIS professions, as well as shared understandings of expectations from mentoring, can promote a supportive and productive mentorship experience for all involved. Ideally the trainer has deep knowledge of anti-racist practice as well as grounding in the world of LIS and an understanding of best-practices for effective mentorship.
NOTES FROM THE PILOT: We worked with Dr. Jerome Offord, Chief Diversity Officer at Harvard, as he had previously provided professional development for our library. He conducted three sessions: one with students only, one with mentors only, and one with students and mentors together. Project team members also attended these sessions.
Engage Your Participants
Recommended Timeline: 4 months before mentorship launch
If following the recommended timeline, you may be recruiting students towards the end of their Spring semester with the hope that they will retain their interest in the program over the summer and be ready to participate when Fall semester begins. In order to maintain participant engagement and build community within the cohort, you may want to establish a communication plan over the summer.
NOTES FROM THE PILOT: We sent emails to student participants once every two weeks that included “Why I became a librarian” stories from project team members and mentors, as well as questions to help the students get to know each other.
Related Resources: Participant Engagement Messages [PDF]
Prepare Your Resources
Recommended Timeline: 6 months before mentorship launch
Review the BIPOC Become Librarians Guide and determine how you will want to adapt or supplement it to fit the needs of your institution and participants.
Related Resources: BIPOC Become Librarians Guide
Train Mentors and Mentees
Recommended Timeline: 1 month before mentorship launch
In order to lay a foundation for successful mentorship, bring mentors and mentees together for a training specific to building effective mentorship relationships, supporting the needs of BIPOC undergraduate students, and navigating issues of diversity, equity, inclusion, and mental health in librarianship.
NOTES FROM THE PILOT: Dr. Jerome Offord, Associate University Librarian (AUL) and Chief Diversity Officer for Harvard Library, provided three 90 minute sessions about the value of mentorship: One for mentors only, one for student participants, and one for mentors and students together. We held the trainings in the Spring before the mentorship launch in the following Fall. Looking back we wished we had held the trainings closer to the time of the mentorship launch. We also heard feedback from mentors that resources related to supporting students who were struggling with mental health would have been helpful, including knowing about the availability of on-campus counselors, and where to draw boundaries between mentorship and mental health counseling.
Launch Mentorships
Recommended Timeline: 8 months before close of program
Bring mentors and mentees together for their first official meeting. Review expectations from the perspectives of the project leads, and provide time for mentors and mentees to share their own expectations within their pods, establish preferred communication methods, and plan for future meetings. Provide a resource to guide future mentoring meetings, knowing mentors will also draw on their own expertise to guide discussions, and may need to veer from any predetermined path as they get to know their mentoring pods.
Related Resources:
Establish Internship Opportunities
Recommended Timeline: 8 months before close of program
Internships allow student participants to see themselves as library workers and gain some firsthand understanding of what library work can be like.
Building on the contact list developed during the “Build your community” step, determine potential sites for internships including libraries, archives, and other institutions or organizations with positions for MLIS graduates. Potential internship hosts can fill out an interest form to provide details about opportunities at their site, including how many interns they have space for, the length of the internship, and whether or not it is paid.
Survey student participants to understand their availability for and interest in an internship.
Establish alternative experiences for students who are not interested in or able to accept an internship that will still provide access to learning about librarianship. Alternatives can include job shadowing experiences or visits to different library sites for behind-the-scenes tours. Students participating in internships may also want to participate in these alternative experiences.
NOTES FROM THE PILOT: While our initial intention had been to provide and/or require internships for all student participants, we soon learned that for some of our students, this would not be feasible. Many of our students already had paid jobs and did not have time to add an internship to their already busy schedules. Some students may have been able to take time off for paid internships, but we had difficulty finding internships that would guarantee pay. Ultimately we were able to reassign some of our grant funding to be able to turn what would have been unpaid internships into paid internships, allowing more students to participate. Out of 17 students who completed the program, 7 took on an internship. Two chose to job shadow. Six participated in a site visit to UC Berkeley’s libraries. A second site visit planned for the California State Archives and California State Library ended up being canceled due to lack of attendance.
Related Resources: