DOI: 10.5061/dryad.p2ngf1vzp
title: Data From: Lighting pathways to success in STEM: A virtual Lab Meeting Program (LaMP) mutually benefits mentees and host labs

description: Developing robust professional networks can help shape the trajectories of
 early career scientists. Yet, historical inequities in STEM fields make
 access to these networks highly variable across academic programs, and
 senior academics often have little time for mentoring. Here, we illustrate
 the success of a Virtual Lab Meeting Program (LaMP). In this program, we
 matched students (“Mentees”) with a more experienced researcher
 (“Mentors”) from a research group. The Mentees then attended the Mentors’
 lab meetings during the academic year with two lab meetings specifically
 dedicated to the Mentee’s professional development. Survey results
 indicate that Mentees expanded their knowledge of the hidden curriculum as
 well as their professional network, while only requiring a few extra hours
 of their Mentor’s time over eight months. In addition, host labs
 benefitted from Mentees sharing new perspectives and knowledge in lab
 meetings. The diversity of the Mentees was significantly higher than the
 Mentors, suggesting that the program increased the participation of
 traditionally underrepresented groups. Finally, we found that providing a
 stipend was very important to many mentees. We conclude that Virtual Lab
 Meeting Programs can be an inclusive and cost-effective way to foster
 trainee development and increase diversity within STEM fields with little
 additional time commitment.
description: Running the Virtual Lab Meeting Training Program
 The first three months of the program require dedicated time for
 recruiting and matching Mentees and Mentors (for a summary of program
 timelines, see Figure 2). One month prior to the start of the academic
 year, we began to advertise the program by sharing a link to our webpage
 with potential mentors and mentees (https://rcn-ecs.github.io/VLMTP/;
 Figure 2). Then, we recruited mentors through a list of personal
 invitations, listservs, and members of the Evolution in Changing Seas RCN.
 We completed the process of recruiting 30-40 mentors approximately two
 weeks after the academic year started (Figure 2). Mentors were required to
 agree with a document that outlined expectations and best practices for
 including their Mentee in lab meetings (see Supplemental
 Materials). After mentors were recruited, we began the
 process of recruiting student Mentees. We generated an email contact list
 to contact as many participants as possible across a diverse group of
 scientific societies and institutions. The contact list consisted of
 scientific societies or diversity lists (e.g. Society for Advancement of
 Chicanos/Hispanics & Native Americans in Science, Diversify
 Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Black Women in Ecology Evolution and
 Marine Science, American Geophysical Union BRIDGE, Association for the
 Sciences of Limnology and Oceanography Multicultural program, Ecology
 Society of America SEEDs program, Asian Americans & Pacific
 Islanders in Geosciences), and a list of 608 professors teaching courses
 in biology, ecology, or evolution at Historically Black Colleges and
 Universities, Hispanic Serving Institutions, and Tribal Colleges and
 Universities. In addition, we advertised to the RCN-ECS listserv and asked
 colleagues to distribute the information among peers.
 To apply, Mentees submitted a 300-word statement that described
 their current research interests and/or experiences related to the themes
 under the Evolution in Changing Seas RCN, future career interests, how
 interactions with a host lab would help to advance their careers and/or
 support their professional development, and a description of how their
 participation in this program would help to increase diversity (broadly
 defined) within the network. They also (i) answered questions about their
 time zone, (ii) listed their top three choices for mentors, (iii) selected
 two keywords that described their research interests from a list, (iv)
 submitted a CV or resume, and (v) optionally answered demographic
 questions. Approximately six weeks into the academic
 year, we closed applications for mentees and started pairing them with
 mentors. Matching was made by two members of the RCN diversity committee
 based on the Mentee’s academic interests, who they listed as their top
 three choices for a Mentor, and time zone alignment, taking into account
 how many Mentees could be assigned to a single Mentor (i.e. usually 1-2
 Mentees per lab group). Due to high request rates for well-known Mentors,
 sometimes we were unable to match a Mentee with one of their top three
 choices. In the few cases where Mentees did not get their top choices,
 pairings were made based on affinity between Mentors’ and Mentees’
 research interests. By the second month of the academic year, we had
 completed the process of pairing mentees with Mentors. Pairs were
 introduced to each other by email and reminded of the program guidelines
 and expectations (Supp Doc: Example Email). Over the
 course of the academic year, Mentees attended lab meetings on an
 independent basis. At the end of the academic year, we distributed
 stipends to students for their participation in the program. To obtain a
 stipend, students had to provide a letter from their Mentor that stated
 the student had completed the program requirements.
 Mentee and Mentor Surveys At the end of the
 academic year in 2022, we distributed surveys to Mentees and another
 survey to Mentors who had participated in the program (for complete
 surveys, see Supplemental Documents). Both surveys included optional
 questions on demographic information, year(s) of participation, activities
 that were part of lab meetings, potential for future collaborations, a
 Likert scale on how they ranked the program from 1 to 10, and open-ended
 feedback (Table 1, left column). We also had an open-ended question where
 participants were encouraged to leave constructive feedback. 
 The Mentee survey included unique Likert scale questions on
 whether the program helped them extend their professional network, advance
 their expertise in subject matter, and how important the stipend was to
 completing the program. We also asked Mentees what kind of interactions
 most helped to advance their professional development, what knowledge they
 gained during the program, and whether they planned to continue
 interactions with the host lab (Table 1, middle column). 
 The Mentor survey included questions on the number of Mentees
 hosted, professional development activities discussed in lab meetings,
 Mentee contributions to lab meetings, how much time mentors invested in
 the program, whether Mentees attended lab meetings beyond the program
 requirements, how many people attended their lab meetings, whether Mentees
 had 1:1 interactions with other lab members, and Likert questions on
 whether they agreed with statements regarding continued interactions and
 benefits of having the Mentee join lab meetings (Table 1, right
 column). IRB Review Our surveys
 were reviewed by the Institutional Review Board at Northeastern University
 (IRB #: 22-03-33) and were considered exempt (DHHS Review Category:
 EXEMPT, CATEGORY #2 Revised Common Rule 45CFR46.104(d)(2)(iii)).
description: # Data From: Lighting pathways to success in STEM: A virtual Lab Meeting
 Program (LaMP) mutually benefits mentees and host labs
 [https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.p2ngf1vzp](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.p2ngf1vzp) ## Description of the data and file structure Metadata for Virtual Lab Meeting Training Program Raw survey data is not provided to protect the anonymity of participants. Survey responses were summarized for each study question and those summaries are provided in the following data tables. --- ### diversity-gender.txt Description: This table summarizes the number of participants that self-identified with gender categories. Participants were allowed to select any that applied. Columns: * Category: gender category * Mentor: number of Mentors that selected that category * Mentee: number of Mentees that selected that category --- ### diversity-race.txt Description: This table summarizes the number of participants who self-identified with racial or ethnic groups. Participants were allowed to select any that applied. Columns: * Category: racial or ethnic group * Mentor: number of Mentors that selected that category * Mentee: number of Mentees that selected that category --- ### diversity-sexual\_orientation.txt Description: This table summarizes the number of participants that self-identified with sexual orientation. Participants were allowed to select any that applied. Columns: * Category: sexual orientation * Mentor: number of Mentors that selected that category * Mentee: number of Mentees that selected that category --- ### mentee-collaborate.txt Description: This table summarizes Mentee's responses to the question of whether they expect to collaborate with host labs in the future. Columns: * Collaborate: Category of response * Mentees: Number of participants that selected that category. --- ### mentee-futureinteract.txt Description: This table summarizes Mentee's responses to the question of whether they expect to interact with host labs in the future. Columns: * Future_Interactions: Category of response * Mentees: Number of participants that selected that category. --- ### Mentee-Knowledge.txt Description: This table summarizes Mentee responses to the question of what kind of knowledge they gained through the program. Mentees were instructed to select any that applied. Columns * Gained: Category of response * Mentees: Number of participants that selected that category. --- ### Mentee-ProfDevelop.txt Description: This table summarizes Mentee's responses to the question of what areas of professional development were covered in lab meetings. Mentees were instructed to select any that applied. Columns: * AreasProfDevel: Category of response * Mentees: Number of participants that selected that category. --- ### mentee-recommend.txt Description: This table summarizes Mentee's responses to the question of whether they would recommend the program to a friend. Columns: * Recommendtofriend: Category of response * Mentees: Number of participants that selected that category. --- ### mentee-stipend.txt Description: This table summarizes Mentee's responses to the question of how important the stipend was to the Mentee's completion of the program. Columns: * Category: Category of response * Participants: Number of participants that selected that category. --- ### MenteeMentorsQs.xlsx Description: This spreadsheet has a list of questions that were used in the survey. There are two tabs: "Mentee" and "Mentor". Columns: * ColumnNameForR: The name of the object used in R * Question: The question from the survey corresponding to that R object. --- ### Mentor-future-interact.txt Description: This table summarizes the Mentor's degree of response to the statement of whether they plan to interact with the Mentee in the next year. Columns: * Future_interaction: Category of response * Mentors: Number of participants that selected that category. --- ### Mentor-lab-benefited.txt Description: This table summarizes the Mentor's degree of response to the statement of whether their lab benefitted from the program. Columns: * Laboratory Benefited: Category of response * Mentors: Number of participants that selected that category. --- ### Mentor-labwillbereousrce-mentee.txt Description: This table summarizes the Mentor's degree of response to the statement of whether their lab will be a resource in the future for the Mentee. Columns: * Labwillbearesource: Category of response * Mentors: Number of participants that selected that category. --- ### mentor-participate-again.txt Description: This table summarizes the Mentor's degree of response to the statement of whether they would participate as a Mentor in the program again. Columns: * ParticipateAgain: Category of response * Mentor: Number of participants that selected that category. --- ### mentor-time.txt Description: This table summarizes Mentor responses to the question of how much time they spent over an academic year, in addition to lab meetings, on participation in the program. Columns: * Time: Category of response * Mentors: Number of participants that selected that category. --- ### Mentors-mentee-contrib.txt Description: This table summarizes the Mentor's responses to the question of how the Mentee contributed to lab meetings. Mentors were instructed to select any that applied. Columns: * Mentee_contributions: Category of response * Mentors: Number of participants that chose that category ---