Receiving and providing mentorship, both formally and informally, forms a critical component of the Biological Invasions IGERT.

• New students in the IGERT will be assigned a three-member guidance committee that will include two faculty trainers from at least two of the IGERT core disciplines and a non-faculty trainer. This committee will help to design an individualized curriculum based on the student's interest areas, facilitate internships, and provide overall guidance until the student forms a committee to oversee dissertation research.


• New students also will be assigned an advanced trainee and a postdoc to serve as resources for the first year in the program.


• The IGERT Principal Investigators will review each trainee's progress annually.

Informal mentoring occurs both individually and collectively.

• Trainers mentor postdoctoral fellows, trainers and postdoctoral fellows mentor graduate trainees, and everyone mentors undergraduates. Many of these take the form of unstructured relationships that arise as a result of interactions during conferences, within the reading group, and in the hallway.


• Brown bag or afternoon professional development workshops will provide trainees with information about topics such as paper- and grant-writing, seminar presentation, working outside academia, networking, and coordinating dual careers.


• Trainees may use a monthly informal student seminar series to make brief presentations and get constructive feedback on work in progress.