Maintaining effective mentoring relationships is a priority in graduate education.
Program directors are expected to:
- Match students to advisors
- Help create and maintain effective mentoring relationships
- Provide guidance to faculty and advisors to help them understand their respective responsibilities in the mentoring/advising relationship
EWU’s academic Policy 303-22 Graduate Students applies to all graduate students and programs. These policies are designed to ensure consistent standards in admissions, registration, degree requirements, and the awarding of degrees across all EWU graduate programs. Please make sure that you and your students are familiar with these policies.
The EWU Policies website can help you quickly find information and forms for every phase of progress and completion for students in graduate programs. You will find detailed information and forms for retaining student status and degree completion, such as:
- Master’s degrees
- Dual degree programs
- Satisfactory Progress Requirements
- Registration
- Leaves of Absence
- Completing final examinations
- Appeals
From time to time, policies are revised. We will notify you of these changes and ask you to pass along to your students those changes that will affect them.
One important metric of success for your graduate program is whether your students are consistently completing your program within your intended program duration. A key to success in this area is consistent and quality academic advising within your program.
As program director, you should:
- Make sure students are assigned to a graduate advisor within your program
- Make sure advisors are meeting with students at least once a year to check in and monitor their progress toward timely degree completion
- Provide students with all necessary information regarding their degree requirements, including:
- A degree plan that outlines the required coursework and a recommended course sequence term-by-term
- A degree timeline with all key student deadlines, benchmarks, and milestones
- Thesis requirements, including the University’s Thesis Guidelines
- Comprehensive exams
- Praxis projects
- Make sure advisors document their advising meetings, particularly in instances when a student is struggling to meet your program’s standards and expectations. In the unfortunate case that a student is unable to make satisfactory progress or needs to be dismissed from your program, you will then have established a record of your program’s consistent efforts to advise the student.
- You should also provide students a list of EWU academic and student success resources that may help them while enrolled in your program. These may include:
- EWU catalog
- EWU Libraries
- Writers’ Center
- PLUS (Program Leading to University Success)
- Disability Support Services
- Career Services
- IT Help Desk
The success of the careers of new graduates, especially in a tight job market, is an important measure of the health and reputation of any graduate program. The program director can be of great service by assisting faculty and students in the job search process, monitoring available options in the discipline’s field, and providing information about graduating students to prospective employers. Though the resources needed will vary by discipline, here are a few common ones:
- Provide a “going on the job market” workshop that is specific to your discipline, with attention to the timing of the market in your field.
- Invite alumni to participate in a panel about different kinds of jobs in your field or discipline.
- From students who have been successful on the job market, collect examples of CVs or resumes, cover letters, and teaching/work portfolios, and make them available to current job seekers.
- Career Services advisors are available to help students as well from Career Services.
