Abstract
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention provided funding (U01 CE002668) to evaluate bystander program efficacy to reduce gender-based violence on college campuses (Aim 1) and to create a mentoring network (Aim 2) for young campus-based researchers interested in violence intervention or prevention (VIP). While an evaluation of this mentoring program is ongoing, our purpose here was to document the strategies used to create, implement, and begin evaluation of this national multi-college mentoring network. As each public college was recruited into this evaluation named multi-college Bystander Efficacy Evaluation (mcBEE), each college was invited to nominate a researcher interested in receiving mentorship as a mcBEE fellow. Senior faculty with active VIP research careers were recruited as mentors. Mentorship occurred through annual meetings over time (2015–2019), weekly to bimonthly calls or video conferencing with 2–3 other fellows, and a mentor forming a group with 3–4 mentees, termed a hive. The initial focus of hive meetings was 1) creating and maintaining an active daily writing practice and 2) developing productivity plans, to include research, personal, and professional goals. Manuscript and grant writing feedback was provided throughout the network electronically or ‘live’ workshops. Annual surveys were implemented to investigate program efficacy. Our mcBEE team was able to successfully assemble a national network of VIP fellows and provide small group and individualized mentoring. Our ultimate goal was that of supporting our fellows’ own trajectories in gender-based VIP research, teaching, administration, or service. Evaluation of our fellow and mentor cohort is ongoing (2015–2019).
Highlights
Evaluation Plan We hypothesized that greater participation with the Multi-Colleges Bystander Efficacy Evaluation (mcBEE) mentoring activities would, over time, increase academic productivity and improve work and life satisfaction
A prospective cohort design was planned for this evaluation measuring academic research skills acquired, goals achieved, and research productivity for both fellows and mentors
Involvement was defined as participation in weekly hive e-meetings with other fellows, monthly e-meetings with the hive mentor, attendance at annual Mentoring mcBEE national meetings, and use of grant or manuscript development resources through Mentoring mcBEE
Summary
Our rationale for developing this national mentorship network was based on the unique needs of researchers in this emerging field. Because this field is relatively nascent (Dahlberg and Mercy 2009), there are challenges resulting from having few resources to support those interested in creating a career in the field of gender-based violence intervention and/or prevention (VIP). These challenges include limited federal funding for this research, the lack of established or novel research methodologies, few collaborators with knowledge and/or experience in this field, and, most importantly, a small yet experienced number of established researchers who have been able to negotiate a successful research career in this field.
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