Per Residence/PSO & Welcome Period Topic
Do you think you were successful in providing newcomers / mentees with support and assistance in the adjustment and transition in their new university environment?
Yes I do think I was successful in providing my mentees and the rest of the newcomers in my residence with support and constant assistance as they adjusted to university and residence life. I always tried my best to be friendly and welcoming which was noticed by the newcomers/my mentees as I was approached throughout welcoming week and up until now for any small or big concern they have. I definitely think my bubbly personality helped the newcomers/my mentees to feel comfortable and at ease to come forward and ask questions they needed answers on. I provided them with all the tools and resources the university offers and my academic mentees received all the information regarding their individual degrees and contact persons within our faculty for future reference. I also encouraged the ladies to embrace the new territory and see it as an opportunity to grow and meet new people. I could see their adjustment in res happened quite quickly and smoothly as they formed friendships and made effort to meet their fellow sisters in res. Their adjustment to campus life also went relatively well as they met people and found their feet quickly.
Absolutely. I always availed myself to the newcomers and provided resources where needed.
I definitely do think I was successful in giving support and assistance. My main goal was to show the mentees that I am there for them and help them in their adjustment. One of the biggest difference was the conversations where I decide to just knock on their door and see how they are doing. Many good conversations came out of this because it was a chance for them to truly reflect on how they were feeling in that moment. I have very independent mentees so they were not very reliant on me or needed much help so I think just having these conversations served as a small reminder that there is still someone who cares even though they didn't need anything from me. I am also not a person who is too overbearing or too much in someone's space and I think this really helped the newcomers because toward the end of the year they were really not needing as many conversations about adjusting and I was able to understand this and give them some space.
What has been the most challenging part of being a mentor? What will you do differently? What will you advise prospective mentors?
I don't think it is very challenging being a mentor however it is all about balance. You must be able to balance your mentees needs academics social activities and other things (fitness/hobbies). It becomes challenging when each facet of your life is demanding but you want to put all your focus by your role as a mentor. I think I immersed myself completely into the role that I forgot to/didn't have time to make time for myself during welcoming week. That is advice that I would give a new mentor give 100% to your mentees mentor team and your HK during welcoming week but don't let the hustle and bustle of that week take away from you caring for your own mental health and try to practice self-care. It is not an easy time for you as you are dealing with your mentee's emotional experiences feelings and situations most of the time. It does influence you; you feel the aftereffects but don't take it on personally as it saps your energy and affects your mental health too. I think time management and balancing my role as a mentor and academics was tough during the first semester. The jump from 1st to 2nd year is quite intense as the workload and standard of work is extremely grueling and requires a lot of time/effort constantly. As does your mentees and trying to find the equilibrium is difficult at times when you have a situation with a mentee and an essay that needs to be handed in the following day; then I would put my mentee first and my work second. That would be another piece of advice I would give learn to start in advance with any assignment or task you have due so that you are prepared with your academic deadlines and always able to give your mentees 100% too.
I think for me personally it was the issues we had with our previous head mentor. It was straneous for myself and the other mentors. I think what should be done differently is the interviewing process and I advice prospective mentors to actively engage with communicating their expectations of the head mentor well in time.
I think juggling all my other responsibilities such as academics with mentoring is a challenging part. I feel like I definitely found a balance in that where I would set out certain times to connect with my mentees and work around that. Another challenge for me was to always ask questions because it's easy to just say Hope you are well instead of asking how they are. I really like to give advice and to help them like that instead of just listening and asking them questions to come to their own conclusion. However I think that I have definitely grown in asking more questions and listening attentively. This is all what I would do differently. Advice I would give to other mentors is to listen instead of speak and ask as many questions as you can so that they come to their own conclusion. One also needs to realise that as the year goes on they are less in need of many conversations so being adaptable to that is important.
How do you think you think you refined and strengthened your "communication" skills during your term as a mentor? Please elaborate.
I started off by applying all the advice given to us in our mentor training this was an incredible help and it pushed me into the right direction when conducting conversations. I think it refined my social skills that I use when communicating I am by nature a very empathetic and friendly person. I do however tend to babble and forget to stop and this aspect was refined by using the techniques we learnt in the training. I learnt to listen intently when my mentees spoke and allow them to feel their emotions and discuss it openly. This helped a lot as my mentees felt comfortable to share and the conversations flowed easily as we bounced off each other. I also strengthened my skills of being impartial unbiased and respectful of others opinions during mentor meetings with our team.
I think through listening - quite ironic. Listening is on the other end of communication; it is not just back of forth conversation. Listening transformed the way we communicated as it elevated simple communication to active communication.
I strengthened my communication skills in two ways. Firstly I learnt to be specific and firm in my communication regarding meetings and get togethers. I would always send messages and say the time and date and ask if they can make it however no one would respond. I learnt that I must then just set a date and time and accept that some people just won't come and I can't please everyone if they do not provide suggestions. Secondly I learnt that listening is as important as talking. It is so important to just listen and not listen to reply. This really makes a difference because mentees will feel like they are coming to their own conclusion and they have someone who really just listens to them. Previously I would always listen to reply and I have now developed a skill to just listen attentively.
How do you think you think you refined and strengthened your "collaboration" skills during your term as a mentor? Please elaborate.
This was such an important aspect of my term as a mentor and collaboration with our mentor team was the main place I experienced it. We always stood united as a team and aimed to work together at all times when trying to solve a problem coming up with ideas giving advice and supporting each other. This became my family and I felt that all our different personalities and ways of thinking meshed together and collaborated while we worked together in our term of office. I always experienced a professional work ethic from each mentor and together we made a wonderful team. Another collaboration was with the mentors and the HK and here I felt that my collaboration skills were strengthened immensely. Our HK was so supportive and included us in decisions discussions planning and treated us as one of their team mates. I learnt here about fairness and equality among different leadership structures and how they can collaborate in aid of a big picture that needed to be executed(welcoming week). Collaborating felt like a sisterhood to me and that's my take away from my experience because my concept of collaboration has become the notion of family respect equality and teamwork infused as one.
I did so by realizing that I could not do everything on my own and the art of delegation is what makes a team successful. It is understanding that mentorship is a team effort.
I have definitely strengthened my collaboration skills in two ways. Firstly with my mentor team. I think especially in welcoming week you have to work together to support one another learn from each other and get advice from one another. Even throughout the year knowing that my mentor team could help me address something really helped me see the importance of collaboration. Another thing was the dynamic of section mentor and academic mentor was another big area I learnt about collaboration. If a mentee asks me about academics I am not doing then I knew I could refer them to their academic mentor and the problem will be addressed. Secondly in my group sessions with the mentees I think the conversations were really helpful only because of everyone's input and thoughts. I could never have shared advice that would be so useful if it was just me giving my thoughts. There is definitely power in collaboration through diverse experiences and thoughts.
How do you think you think you refined and strengthened your "critical thinking" skills during your term as a mentor? Please elaborate.
I refined my critical thinking by constantly having to think on my feet when dealing with situations regarding my mentees and having to come up with a rational clear and rapid response. This definitely strengthened my problem solving skills too as many a time I was thrown into the deep end and needed to solve problems alone without having time to ask for advice. This also strengthened my confidence in my own decision making skills I feel so confident about my decision making skills as I know now I have the capability to come up with a good response after considering each opinion/view/angle of a situation and asking relevant questions before coming forth with an answer. This all requires critical thinking and I am grateful for being placed out of my comfort zone and head on into a situation as these skills were refined in the process.
By seeking advice. It was important in order to get the best outcomes was to actively listen to the other mentors' views and opinions in order to open my mind.
I think I learnt this through knowing how to approach each mentee is very important. Many of my mentees are different and they need different things. I also think that knowing how to help each mentee is different so you need to think whether to refer them to someone else or advise them differently. This area is one that I feel I didn't have a very big growth in because I didn't feel like I had to use lots of critical thinking. I had the resources available to me and I knew in some cases I just had to listen and not think what to say.
How do you think you think you refined and strengthened your "creativity" skills during your term as a mentor? Please elaborate.
My creativity skills were definitely refined and strengthened in my term as a mentor. I am quite creative out going and enjoy coming up with new ideas. I was able to strengthen this skill during welcoming week with my mentees when we had to do various activities and games with them that required us to adhere to lockdown regulations and still have fun. It was extremely fulfilling seeing my ideas come to life and see my mentees enjoy taking part in activities I formulated for their experience to be memorable. I had to come up with an idea to have an afternoon activity for bonding with my mentees. I took my mentees for a socially distanced movie during welcoming week at PULP and it turned out great and we all had a wonderful time.
Through collaboration and thinking outside of the best. Sharing ideas and bouncing off ideas off of people created such a creative and flexible environment.
I think I definitely strengthened my creativity skills because( a little bit unrelated to this) I had to decorate my section and that really made me be creative because I am not naturally creative. I think I also had to think of different ways to present the sessions I had so that it was interesting and engaging. Whether that be sharing my own experience first or sharing experts opinions versus letting the mentees share from the start was dependant on the session itself. I also grew in being creative in approaching my mentees. I realised that some were very eager for group sessions whilst others were not really bothered. I knew then I had to then knock on their doors and check on them so my approach was different for each mentee.
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