...and they all rolled over?
My advisor wants us to bring a new undergrad in the lab for a project that is completely unrelated to anything any of the grad students or postdocs are working on. The idea is that I would do the hands-on mentoring, and an emeritus professor would get a chance to have some fun in his retirement by "overseeing" the project. Apparently I was chosen based on my potential to be a great mentor to this student.
My worries:
1. That I won't have time to add this to my growing list of projects. I doubt the emeritus professor will be very involved in the training that is required in teaching even basic lab skills to an inexperienced freshman/sophomore. Though I enjoy working with undergrads, I wish this student would at least be able to work on something that would be helpful for my project, thereby making it a more synergistic research relationship.
2. My advisor wants to give this undergrad his/her own lab space. I'm worried this is going to cause a huge stir in our lab since we're over capacity as is. I recently heard two grad students in a heated quarrel about chemical hood space, and I worry that there will neither be space nor tolerance of an undergrad taking up prime real estate.
We shall see how this goes! I plan to bring up these concerns with my advisor, but still oblige and mentor the student (I'm not sure I have the option to really say no anway).
5 weeks ago
You do not need to experience "hands-on mentoring" at the expense of your own research. Sounds like you already know how to mentor. Try to see if you can have the undergrad help your project too, otherwise it's a total waste of your time.
ReplyDeleteCE, you're right... but being a newish postdoc, I'm not sure where the limits are just yet. If this had been with my thesis advisor, it would have been a lot easier.
ReplyDeleteI'll bring it up, and we'll see how it goes.