First Informal Mentoring Dinner was a Wild Success!

Last week, UMass Amherst undergraduates in the College of Natural Sciences and College of Engineering were able to attend an informal mentoring session with some of the school’s graduate students in STEM fields.  A pizza dinner was served, and undergraduates had a unique opportunity to chat with their graduate student counterparts.  Around thirty undergraduate mentees and graduate mentors attended the dinner, which included a short presentation on applying to graduate school with special tips like how to receive free applications and free campus visits.  With application season right around the corner, many of the junior and senior students benefited from the presentation, and the ability to discuss such issues with graduate students who are already well-experienced with applying to a graduate program at one of the nation’s top research institutions.

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Conversations at the dinner tables included such important topics as applying to grad school (of course), finding the best programs for a given field, life as a grad student, and obtaining different funding sources. Copies of the presentation were emailed to the undergraduates who attended.  Emails were also exchanged between mentors and mentees during many of the discussions so that the conversation could continue after dinner. The next dinners will be on Oct 14th and Nov 13th, so stay tuned for registration details if you would like to attend!