13. October 2019 Interim Balance of via:mento_ocean mentoring programme

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In December 2018 ended the third cycle of the mentoring programme via:mento_ocean, financed by the Cluster of Excellence "Future Ocean". It is a good occasion to make an interim balance of the programme.

 

The programme started 2013 with nine participants from marine sciences. Since 2013 we had three cycles (2013-15; 2015-17; 2017-18) of the programme. 22 female scientists took part in the last cycle. The increased number of participants is among others due to the gender-friendly recruitment policy of the Cluster.

In the following graphic, we have a deeper look into the participants, where they were working, when they joined the programme:

33% of them is coming from abroad, underlining the internationality of the programme. 60% of the mentees has a female mentor, which show us, the importance of female role models in science.

We have an alumnae list and we are monitoring the mentees of the three cycles, which means, we follow their career steps. Of course we cannot show directly that participating in mentoring programme makes the participants successful in their career on a long term, but the mentoring programme is for sure one of the instruments, that enable mentees to reflect about their career steps, their career goals and in general about the academic system. We can see that of the first 2 cycles of via:mento_ocean about 30% of the mentees have reached a better working position (e.g. a professorship or a permanent position). Moreover in the evaluation of the programme mentees are satisfied with the decision to participate in the programme and valuate the mentoring relationship as "very usefull". A mentee of the last cycle says: "I discovered the advantages of having a mentor, something that was not before in my mind. I have benefit much from establishing this new relationship".

If the Ocean will still be a part of the future of the mentoring programme via:mento is going to be decided upon in the next months.