The latest book from CUR is Excellence in Mentoring Undergraduate Research, edited by Maureen Vandermaas-Peeler, Paul C. Miller, and Jessie L. Moore. The volume offers both advice (to mentors and institutions) and information about the latest trends in mentoring. The biggest overall argument of the book is that we need to find ways to “scale access to high-quality mentored UR within institutions,” bundling and scaffolding opportunities within the curriculum (217). Given this goal, the book is clearly aimed at a wide audience, but there are some key lessons for faculty in the arts and humanities.
Sections specific to the arts and humanities
As you might expect, the arguments drawn from surveys are less specifically useful to the arts and humanities because STEM projects still dominate undergraduate research. In one survey mentioned, for example, only 6.1% of the respondents were in humanities and arts (23). But five of the volume’s 27 contributors are in the arts and humanities: one artist (Dijana Ihas), three English/writing faculty (Jane Greer, Jessie Moore, and Michael Neal), and CURAH’s own Jenny Olin Shanahan. Their experiences come through in case studies and in specific recommendations. One special section, by music professor Dijana Ihas, is specifically devoted to “mentoring research in the arts” (138-142). Later, in the chapter on integrating research into the curriculum, there appears a short program-level case study of the English curriculum at St. Mary’s University of Minnesota (189-190).
Trending topics
Including underrepresented students in undergraduate research
Integrating research into the curriculum
Co-mentoring
Faculty development
If you can only read one chapter, what should it be?
For individual faculty mentors: Chapter 4: “10 Salient Practices for Mentoring,” by Helen Walkington, Eric E. Hall, Jenny Olin Shanahan, Elizabeth Ackley, and Kearsley Stewart
For anyone involved in curriculum development: Chapter 7: “Undergraduate Research in the Curriculum and as Pedagogy” by Brad Wuetherick, John Willison, and Jenny Olin Shanahan.
For administrators: Chapter 5: “Supporting Faculty Development for Mentoring in Undergraduate Research, Scholarship, and Creative Work,” by Vicki L. Baker, Jane Greer, Laura G. Lunsford, Dijana Ihas, and Meghan J. Pifer.
Helping students use their developing arts and humanities skills to convince prospective employers
Those of us in the arts and humanities are well aware of disparaging messages in popular and academic media about the “uselessness” of our disciplines. As the number of traditional-age undergraduates is on the decline, as the cost of higher education and student-loan debts rise, and as suspicions swirl about whether a college education is actually worthwhile, faculty and academic administrators are expected to attend more closely than before to the recruitment, retention, timely degree-completion, and post-baccalaureate success of our students. Those of us in the arts and humanities have an additional burden of proof of our value, especially given statements from political leaders about the unviability of majoring in fields like anthropology (FL Gov. Rick Scott), gender studies (NC Gov. Pat McCrory), philosophy (Senator Marco Rubio), art history (President Barack Obama), and other areas of study perceived as impractical and even self-indulgent.
Calling certain degrees unmarketable might seem strange given our historically low unemployment at the moment. But the National Center for Education Statistics (2018) recently reported that nearly half of all recent college graduates are unemployed or underemployed (i.e., piecing together part-time work and/or working in low-skilled jobs). One explanation is that employers are competing for skilled workers, but another more pervasive and troubling explanation is that so many employers believe millennials are ill-equipped for 21st-century jobs.
The problem: employers don’t believe students have the right skills.
Studies commissioned by the AAC&U (Hart Research Associates, 2015; 2018) and the Chronicle of Higher Education and Public Radio International’s Marketplace (Fisher, 2013) have reported that hiring managers and supervisors in a wide range of businesses and nonprofit organizations believe recent college graduates lack basic proficiencies critical to success in the workplace, such as communication skills, complex problem-solving, and working across difference. Employers gave very low grades to recent graduates on all 17 of the AAC&U’s essential learning outcomes of college, including those deemed most important for careers:
Oral communication
Working effectively on teams
Written communication
Ethical decision-making
Critical thinking & analysis
Applying knowledge to real-world problems
Nearly all of those surveyed said those six skills are more important than a job candidate’s alma mater or major. In order to consider applicants for further review, interviews, and hiring, employers are looking for evidence of those experiences and skills in job-seekers’ resumes and cover letters.
The solution: undergraduate research in the arts and humanities provides evidence of key skills.
Here’s where undergraduate research can help. Undergraduate researchers in the arts and humanities are in a particularly strong position for demonstrating with evidence that they have developed the skills and dispositions most highly valued by a broad range of potential employers. Their faculty mentors can help them see how to make the case. Here are some ways I have coached arts and humanities majors at Bridgewater State University to use their undergraduate-research experiences as indicators of the most highly valued workplace skills.
Arts and humanities scholars demonstrate communication.
Proficiency in oral and written communication (combined here for the sake of brevity) is shown by giving talks at campus symposia and even regional or national conferences, engaging interpersonally with peers and experts in those settings, and committing to revising written work (including in response to critical feedback) in order to convey ideas effectively.
Arts and humanities research can include collaboration.
Skills associated with working collaboratively on teams can be demonstrated by arts and humanities majors (even if they are less likely than students in the sciences to conduct collaborative research) when they draw upon situations in which they saw themselves as part of a group (e.g., a community of practice) with common goals. In an AAC&U survey, 96% of employers agreed that “all college students should have experiences that teach them how to solve problems with people whose views are different from their own” (Hart Research Associates, 2015). Those mentored in working across difference, a value in many of our fields, can highlight that understanding in their job searches. The practice of accepting and learning from constructive criticism, explicit in the arts and valued in the humanities as well, are effectively discussed in cover letters and interviews.
Arts and humanities research fosters ethical thinking.
Ethical decision-making can be evidenced by students whose work aims for the common good and who are able to explain how they have grappled with complex issues in their research. Considering the consequences of their research decisions—and modifying their course of action when needed—demonstrate students’ thoughtful, and often principled, choices.
Arts and humanities scholars demonstrate critical thinking.
The development of skills of critical thinking and analysis is integral to undergraduate research; students tackling “actively contested” questions (Kuh, 2008) must take resourceful, creative approaches to those questions, problems, or goals. The scholarly practices in the arts and humanities of “unpacking” theories, texts, cultural norms, etc.; examining assumptions; and determining what needs to be known or done to accomplish the goals of the project, are of vital importance in a range of careers.
Arts and humanities research focuses on real-world problems.
One of the reasons students express satisfaction in undergraduate research is that they finally had the opportunity to apply knowledge to real-world problems—something that arts and humanities majors do not always experience in their coursework. Undergraduate research engages students in the authentic questions of the discipline or another community. It deepens student understanding through active learning, especially when they immerse themselves in long-term projects. The ability to describe such directly applicable work helps arts and humanities majors stand out in their job searches, especially because we humanists and artists commonly guide students in metacognitive practices that allow them to reflect on their learning and its applications beyond the classroom and academic program.
Conclusion
Despite the denigration of the arts and humanities in political messages and popular culture, there is little evidence that such majors are less viable when it comes to post-baccalaureate employment prospects. In fact, data from multiple sources speak to the immense value of certain skills and dispositions, developed particularly well through undergraduate research, including in the arts and humanities. The Chronicle of Higher Education headline may have said it best in touting the positive job outlook for students in our fields, “If They Have Some Specific Skills Too” (Blumenstyk, 2016). One of the important aspects of mentoring arts and humanities undergraduate-researchers can be to show them how to highlight the sought-after skills that they are developing in their projects.
Kuh, George D. 2008. High-impact educational practices: What they are, who has access to them, and why they matter. Washington D.C.: Association of American Colleges and Universities.
(Note: the above post is a summary of a presentation Jenny Olin Shanahan gave at the CUR Biennial in 2018).
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Recently, a professor in the history department came to me with a question: “How do I mentor a freshman history student in research, when this student has none of the skills required to do original research in history?” The question arose because one of our Undergraduate Research Fellows – first-year students selected to participate in a four-year program of vigorous involvement in research on the basis of a competitive application process – had approached him asking if she could work with him. Because the majority of our URFs are interested in social science, education, business, and STEM research, he had not encountered such a request before. While experienced in mentoring upper-level history students in research, he had no game plan for working with a first-year student with, as he put it, “no skills.”
This is a challenge for a lot of us working in the humanities. In other fields, such as laboratory sciences or education, the apprenticeship model, in which early-stage students interested in research join a group, and then learn by watching other, more experienced student perform protocols and discuss outcomes, gradually building their own responsibilities and skills within the group, makes it relatively straightforward to include inexperienced, novice students in the research culture. In the humanities, where we are more likely to work alone, and even the most basic data collection requires expertise in such skills as paleography, archival searching, and language translation, mentoring a first-year aspiring researcher can seem like a burdensome and impossible task.
My own experience has taught me that like so many other things, successful mentoring of entry-level student research in the humanities is all about clear communication and close listening. Here, I am condensing a few of the main points from my conversation with my colleague from history, which he later reported to me were quite helpful in getting started with his eager, but unformed protegee.
Motivations matter
Begin by asking the student to talk about what drove them to come talk to you about research opportunities. Are they part of a program (such as our fellows, or an honors seminar) that requires them to meet with professors and discuss research? If so, what are they hoping to get out of the experience? Do they want to build skills? Are they looking for a line on their resume? Are they driven by curiosity about the field more generally? This is the listening phase – you will get a good sense of whether this is a student who would be engaged and interesting to work with. I think it’s always okay to say no, though best if you can point them towards some other avenues (other faculty, a course that the department offers, a student-run organization) for exploration.
Ask about their existing skills
We tend to assume that first-year students have no skills, but especially with the kind of ambitious students who actually overcome the immense anxiety barrier to come talk to you in person this may not be the case. For example, when I was first mentoring a first-year art history student, in my initial conversation with her I learned that she had taken four years of high-school Spanish and done a service project in Guatemala. Her language skills made her a great research assistant. In the case of my colleague’s history student, she really did have very few skills, but her enthusiasm and her openness to learning meant that she ended up doing some very good bibliographic research for him. All he had to do was show her how to use the various search tools, give her some instruction in Zotero, and she was off to the races.
Define expectations
This is probably the most important part of the conversation you’ll have with the novice researcher. What are the student’s expectations in terms of time commitments and learning outcomes? Do they want to have a presentable product at the end of the year? Be a co-author on a paper? Get paid? Get credit? On your end, you also need to be clear: what kinds of tasks can you imagine the student performing? What are realistic outcomes for the work they’ll be doing? If you’re thinking, “Great, this student can scan and process documents” and the student is thinking “I’m going to see my name in print” this could lead to some trouble down the road, so it is important to get this out in the open. I think it’s always perfectly fine to do as my history colleague did – start the student on what a more experienced researcher might consider the boring ground-work – putting together bibliographies, searching databases, and compiling easily-accessible information. The important thing is that the student understands how their work fits into the larger research project. My first-year Spanish-fluent student ended up getting a thank-you in the acknowledgement note in a published essay, and for her that was exactly what she expected, and therefore quite gratifying.
Use peer-mentoring
Do you have a more advanced student, perhaps a senior working on a senior thesis, who might serve as a role model and near-peer mentor for your novice student? In many disciplines (and also in the humanities where they are practiced collaboratively, especially in Europe), groups of researchers at all levels working on related projects regularly meet and discuss their progress. Consider getting your research students together on a regular basis to talk. This way your own research process is made transparent to the students, and you’ll have a better sense of the progress they’re making, but above all, the less experienced students will be able to imagine where they might be in a year or two.
Benefits
While it is no doubt true that first-year students and others new to research in humanities disciplines do not come through the door with the types of skills and understandings that allow us to do our work at a high level, this does not mean that they cannot contribute. Starting them off with very basic tasks, but contextualizing those tasks through regular conversations about the overall progress of the research, we initiate them into the culture of humanities inquiry. All too often, students have been told “this is how you write a research paper” without really learning the WHY of research, that is to say, they have been shown the process but not given any insight into the motivations and concepts that drive the process. Getting a first-year student inside the machine takes a little effort, but once there, they tend to get very excited about doing research (way more excited than you might expect, given that all they’re actually doing is scanning documents or doing data entry, or whatever), and they learn, intrinsically, both the hows and the whys of your discipline.
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The Arts and Humanities Division of the Council on Undergraduate Research
