International Mentoring Conference

1. Mentoring the Millennial Generation
Data from Phenomenological
Study
Mary Ann Pearson, Ed.D.
California Baptist University
October, 2013

2. Background:
• I have worked with University Journalism and
Public Relations students since 2005 when I
joined California Baptist University as the
Faculty Adviser for student publications.
• I tried many research based approaches as I
worked to guide the students to achieve
excellence.

3. Doctoral Study-2010
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I have three areas of passion
Research based education/leadership
Journalism
Public Relations

4. Experience
• Worked in Journalism and Public Relations
• Taught elementary school in a public school
• Served as a professor and faculty
adviser/program director at California Baptist
University and CBU Online and Professional
Studies

5. Interviews for the study• The interviews were conducted in 2009.
Social media was a fairly new communication
platform and I used social media methods to
research interviewees. I interviewed 25
seniors or recent graduates from schools
located across the country. The students were
all involved in student publications and they
were members of College Media Advisers.

6. Emergent Themes
• Faking It
• Experiential Learning-Working as a
Team/Mentoring Relationships
• External Networking- Making a Difference,
Understanding How Things Work

7. StoriesStudents who were involved in student publications said the learned best by
participating in Mentoring Relationships.
Marty
Jill
Tammy

8. Essence of Mentoring-
• Mentoring relationships help students learn to improve
writing skills by meeting with mentors and working
through articles line by line discussing articles and edits.

9. Essence…
• “Learning took place as we networked and
met with mentors. We appreciated mentors
who invited us into their world and allowed us
to take advantage of established relationships.
They offered us advise and encouragement at
every step.”

10. Creating a Mentoring Culture• Participants in the study defined effective
educational experiences as learning that took
place through mentors and mentees meeting
on a regular basis.
• These students who communicated primarily
with social media and text messaging-longed
for face to face communication with mentors.

11. Creating a Mentoring Culture
• After completing the interviews and the
dissertation, I went back to my position of
Faculty Adviser for the student publications,
determined to create a mentoring culture. I
created a mentoring program. Senior student
editors mentored underclassmen and I
mentored the seniors.

12. The Importance of a Standardized
Program• Protégé/Mentee – The person assigned to work
with a Guide or a Mentor. Usually a protégé
is…(new hire, at-risk student, etc.)
• Guide/Buddy – A more experienced person
assigned to work with and support a protégé who
has enough knowledge and experience to need
less than full scale mentoring.
• Mentor - A more experienced person assigned to
work with and support a protégé who has little or
no previous knowledge and experience to do
what’s expected of them.

13. Transformational/Servant Leadership
and Mentoring
• I implemented leadership training to provide skills in
transformational and servant leadership.
• Servanthttp://www.regent.edu/acad/global/publications/sl_pr
oceedings/2005/spears_practice.pdf
• Transformationalhttp://changingminds.org/disciplines/leadership/theor
ies/burns_transformational.htm
•

14. How does mentoring look in an online
environment• After a promotion to the position of Program
Director for the Master of Arts in Public
Relations in 2012. I left my position of faculty
adviser for the student publications and began
teaching online and hybrid courses.

15. How does mentoring look in an online
program?
• We use blogs, twitter, facebook, text
messages, Web Ex and in office/phone
meetings, phone conferences.
• The act of mentoring remains the same but
platform is different-it is online and hybrid
• Plans are underway to begin a mentoring
program for new faculty and for students.

16. • Thanks and this presentation can be found at
slide share.