Long-Term Mentoring for Computer Science Researchers

Abstract

Early in the pandemic, we -- leaders in the research areas of programming languages (PL) and computer architecture (CA) -- realized that we had a problem: the only way to form new lasting connections in the community was to already have lasting connections in the community. Both of our academic communities had wonderful short-term mentoring programs to address this problem, but it was clear that we needed long-term mentoring programs. Those of us in CA approached this scientifically, making an evidence-backed case for community-wide long-term mentoring. In the meantime, one of us in PL had impulsively launched an unofficial long-term mentoring program, founded on chaos and spreadsheets. In January 2021, the latter grew to an official cross-institutional long-term mentoring program called SIGPLAN-M; in January 2022, the former grew to Computer Architecture Long-term Mentoring (CALM). The impacts have been strong: SIGPLAN-M reaches 328 mentees and 234 mentors across 41 countries, and mentees have described it as "life changing" and "a career saver." And while CALM is in its pilot phase -- with 13 mentors and 21 mentees across 7 countries -- it has received very positive feedback. The leaders of SIGPLAN-M and CALM shared our designs, impacts, and challenges along the way. Now, we wish to share those with you. We hope this will kick-start a larger long-term mentoring effort across all of computer science.