The 2012-2013 Peer Tutor & Mentor Summit was this past Friday, and as usual, it delivered on its promise: tutors and mentors from across DePaul’s programs had a chance to share their strategies, goals, career advice, and more. It was also a reminder of the vastness of DePaul’s offerings for its students: in attendance were mentors from Veteran’s Affairs, tutors from the Collaborative for Multilingual Writing and Research (CMWR) and the International Student Experience Exchange, advisors from the Career Center, and many others. Indeed, the array of programs at DePaul is every bit as diverse as DePaul’s students themselves, and so also were the rewards that the summiteers took with them.
Speaking of rewards, your humble correspondent even came out with a new coffee mug to add to the collection of swag from past summits. (Full disclosure: my canvas gift bag from the last summit was instrumental in a recent bike accident involving your correspondent. The coffee mug seems like a safer alternative.) After dosing myself with several cups of coffee too many, I had the opportunity to connect with my neighbors at my table, who probably found your correspondent a little too energized, but were polite enough. At Table #7 were peer career advisors from the Career Center, representatives from Veteran’s Affairs, and tutors from the CMWR, Writing Groups, as well as the Writing Center. We talked about some of the best advice we had received when we started out in our work. A sampling:
- Be curious about the students and community you tutor or mentor
- Set clear goals for your interactions
- Be real: if it isn’t going as planned, then change the plan
- Respect the courage it takes students to come seek guidance
The afternoon session included seven different interactive round-robin workshops, concerning the forthcoming DePaul learning commons, how we incorporate technology into our workflow as tutors and mentors, and how to best present our work as tutors and mentors to prospective employers. On that particular note, your correspondent learned that the most sought-after workers in today’s job market are:
- strong communicators
- analytical
- interpersonal
- team-players
- problem-solvers
Another bit of advice from the Career Center folks: make a Linked-In profile. Like, right now.
The time flew by very quickly as we laughed about the odd challenges we share in our tutoring and mentoring work, and filled up our to-do lists with new goals and professional development ideas.
That about does it for your correspondent. What about you? What was your favorite moment from the summit?