BUILDING EFFECTIVE PEER MENTORING TRAINING PROGRAM AT THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT EL PASO 2016 Sun Conference the University of Texas at El Paso

Authors ■Danielle X. Morales, Post-Doctoral Fellow with BUILDing SCHOLARS, University of Texas at El Paso, 500 West University Ave, El Paso, TX, ■Cira M. Montoya Olson, Associate Director, Academic Technologies, University of Texas at El Paso, 500 West University Ave, El Paso, TX, ■Andrea L. Pina Marin, BUILDing SCHOLARS Peer Mentor, University of Texas at El Paso, 500 West University Ave, El Paso, TX, ■Cecyl Castañon, BUILDing SCHOLARS Peer Mentor, University of Texas at El Paso, 500 West University Ave, El Paso, TX, ■Jaime A. Morales, BUILDing SCHOLARS Peer Mentor, University of Texas at El Paso, 500 West University Ave, El Paso, TX, ■Roy Arrieta, BUILDing SCHOLARS Peer Mentor, University of Texas at El Paso, 500 West University Ave, El Paso, TX, 79968

Peer Mentoring ■Peer-mentoring in higher education is regarded as one of the more effective interventions to ensure the success and retention of vulnerable students. ■Effective mentoring programs can improve the retention and raise the GPA of undergraduate students. ■Many universities and colleges including the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) have implemented some form of peer mentoring as part of their student support services. ■The success of these programs led to the expansion of peer mentoring as a mechanism for improving academic success in higher education.

Peer Mentoring Training ■One of the key challenges many peer mentoring programs are facing is the lack of high quality peer mentor training. ■Regardless of the kind of mentoring service, effective training of mentors is considered critical to the success of mentoring programs. ■The skills and knowledge required of a peer mentor should be not assumed and the organization instituting a peer mentoring program must commit resources to training.

BUILDing SCHOLARS at UTEP ■BUILDing SCHOLARS is a center of excellence established at UTEP with support from the National Institutes of Health - Common Fund. ■Our goal is to implement a suite of programs and activities that positively transform the training of the next generation of biomedical researches from U.S. Southwest groups through a multi-institution consortium. ■The Center supported students with full or partial scholarships, covering up to 15 credit-hours of tuition, as well as a stipend. ■We emphasize a scaffolded training approach through a research-driven curriculum and strong mentoring program, which integrate students into a community of practice that will develop and expand their professional network.

BUILD Peer Mentoring Program Overview ■ The Peer Mentoring Program provides academic and peer support to first-year BUILDing SCHOLARS students to help make their college experiences exciting, fulfilling and successful. In particular, the program enables first-year scholars to effectively complete their educational objectives. Peer mentors are sophomore BUILDing SCHOLARS students who receive weekly mentoring and leadership training to prepare them to assist their mentees. Both mentors and mentees can benefit from the program. ■ Mentors and mentees are matched based on professional and personal similarities using a matching algorithm designed specifically for this program and operated through the Chronus platform.

BUILD Peer Mentoring Program Program Objectives ■ Objective 1: BUILDing SCHOLARS Peer Mentors will develop and enhance their strategic planning, emotional intelligence and mentoring and leadership skills, while facilitating mentoring relationships and creating a professional developmental network within the BUILD community of practice. ■ Objective 2: BUILDing SCHOLARS Mentees (first-year BUILDing Scholars students) will develop successful strategies to enhance their academic and research performance, while creating a professional developmental network within the BUILD community of practice.

BUILD Peer mentoring training follows two successful models: Mentoring Institute at University of New Mexico and University Studies Peer Mentor Program at Portland State University.

Program Facilitator Peer Mentors Student Mentees Mentoring Level 2 Mentoring Level 1

Peer Mentors Student Mentees Mentoring Level 1

Student Voice ■He (the peer mentor) helps a lot because he’s taking some of the classes I’m taking. So he helps me with those (classes). ■I’ve been meeting with my peer mentor and she’s really and really cool, she always shows up prepared to our meetings, she has a set of questions to ask. She’s really open to helping as well. She always reminds me about the tutoring that’s being offered. And sometimes she’s like ‘If you feel uncomfortable with that, I can help you’, so she’s been great she’s nice. I look forward to our meetings and she’s dedicated to what she does so I really like that as well. ■I really enjoy that it’s a lot of fun so for me, the first time I met with Jaime (the peer mentor) I was really shy, that’s who I am, I’m not very open or anything, but we had a meeting yesterday and I was opening up to him, and we were laughing. He was giving me good advice about time management, and helping me with things that I…if I didn’t have a mentor I wouldn’t know what to do. ■The peer mentoring program I’m really liking it because my mentor got us involved with the other mentees. So I think yesterday we went rock climbing and stuff like that, and he’s taught us a lot about time management, and it’s been helping me a lot because he asks ‘What are your weaknesses’, and then that’s what he really focuses on so I’m really enjoying that.

Program Facilitator Peer Mentors Mentoring Level 2

■ ■UTEP Presents: Mentoring Matters with Dr. Danielle Morales and Jaime MoralesUTEP Presents: Mentoring Matters with Dr. Danielle Morales and Jaime Morales

“Mentoring Matters” at UTEP ■"Mentoring Matters" is produced by Academic Technologies (AT) for the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) and promotes the sharing of pathways to leadership. ■This web series provides testimonials from high-achieving leaders at UTEP (administration, faculty, staff and students) who serve as mentors, as well as from the protégés who have gained wisdom and value from them. ■UTEP Presents: Mentoring Matters seriesUTEP Presents: Mentoring Matters series

Dr. Lourdes Echegoyen Dr. Stephen Aley Dr. Marc Cox Dr. Thomas Boland Dr. Osvaldo Morera Dr. Tim Collins Dr. Sara GrineskiDr. Homer NazeranDr. Guadalupe CorralDr. Delfina Dominguez NIH BUILD Award No. 8 UL1 GM HHMI Sustaining Excellence Award No

Acknowledgement ■The Creative Studios team at Academic Technologies Skyler T. Carreon, Videographer, Adrian E. Meza, Video Editor Janet Hill, Instructional Technologist

Thank you!