Appendix B:
Interview Protocols for Student Participants and Mentors
Distributed Mentor Project Evaluation
Protocol for Second Interview with 1996 Student Participants
(Conducted 1-4 Weeks After Program Completion
Overview
1.?So you just finished the program. Tell me about your experience.
2.?Did this program turn out to be what you had expected?
3.?How has the program influenced you, if at all?
Research Aspect
4.?Tell me about your research project.
5.?What kind of research does your mentor do? How did your research fit in with your mentorâs research?
6.?How did you get started on the project? If you could go back to the beginning of the summer, could you walk me through how you got started?
a) How much time did you have to spend preparing to work on a project?
b) Who decided what you would work on?
c) Did you work on a single project throughout the summer?
d) Was your research part of a larger project?
7.?Did you feel like you were really doing research?
8.?a) How was your mentor involved in your research?
b) Did other people (undergraduates? graduate students?) play a part in your research? If so, how?
9.?a) When you had questions about the project, who did you turn to?
b) How available was that person to you?
10.?Were there any pivotal moments or breakthroughs in your research?
If so, please describe and explain what brought this about.
11.?Did you finish the project this summer?
12.?What will you do with your research results for this project?
a) Will the results of your research be published or presented at a conference, either on its own or as part of a larger project?
b) Before the program started, did you expect that you might end up with a publication?
13.?Do you feel that the work that you did this summer was important?
a) Do you think that it has real world applications? Is that important to you?
b) Did you learn anything new about the process of doing research?
Probe: If so, what? If not, why?
14.?Based on your experience this summer, what are your feelings about doing research?
Probe: Is this what you expected?
Mentor Aspect
15.?When you first walked into your mentorâs office, what did you do? Tell me about the first meeting.
Probe: Can you compare this with the last meeting?
16.?What were your meetings like?
a) What were they about?
b) Who led them? (What role did you play in them?)
c) How did you feel?
17.?What was your mentor like?
18.?How did you interact with her?
19.?Was this what you had expected?
20.?How often did you see your mentor?
Probe: In what context did you see your mentor? (in a group once a week, socially, etc.)
21.?Did you talk to your mentor about her own experiences in graduate school and in her career?
If yes, was talking to her about those kinds of things a topic of interest for you? What did that mean for you?
If no, would you have liked to have talked about these kinds of things with your mentor?
22.?Would you want to be like your mentor?
23.?What did it mean for you to have a female mentor?
{If the student mentions feeling more comfortable with a female mentor}
24.? I would like to understand better why you feel more comfortable with a woman. Can you compare and contrast your experience interacting with your mentor with interacting with male faculty members?
University Aspect
25.?a) Where were you living during the program?
b) Who arranged the housing?
c) Did you live with graduate students?
d) If yes, were any of them in your area?
26.?What do you think of the housing arrangements?
27.?Describe the social aspect of the program.
28.?a) Did you meet many graduate students? How?
b) What did you think of them? How did you interact with them?
c) Did you talk with them about their experience in graduate school?
29.?What is your impression of graduate school?
30.?Has participating in this program changed your view of graduate school at all?
31.?Do you feel you can succeed in graduate school?
32.?a) Did you meet many faculty members? How?
b) What did you think of them?
33.?What do you think of {this university} as a place to go to graduate school?
Overall Program
34.?Is there anything that would have made the program better for you?
35.?How helpful was the Guide in creating a successful mentoring project?
36.?Were you aware of the email discussion forum which was set up for the students in the CRA-DMP?
If yes, for what purpose did you use it? How helpful was it?
If no, why not?
Probe: Would assurance of anonymity make you more likely to use it?
37.?Is there anything that you wish you had known about the program before you started?
38.?Did this program affect your future career plans?
If so, how?
?If not, why?
Distributed Mentor Project Evaluation
Protocol for First Interview with 1996 Student Participants
(Conducted 1 Month Prior to Participation in Program)
Background
1.?a) What year in school are you?
b) When do you expect to graduate?
Specific Major/Area
2.?What is your major? From your perspective, how difficult do you find your major?
Probe: How do you deal with a demanding major?
Probe: Do you have a specific area you are especially interested in?
3.?What helped you to decide to go into that major/area?
Probe: Family influence? Teacher influence?
4.?What are your concerns and expectations about majoring in {this major}? Do you have any concerns about a career in this major following graduation?
5.?Is there a graduate program in your area at your school?
a) If so, what type of contact have you had with it?
b) If not, have you had contact with other graduate programs?
If so, what type of contact? (graduate students, etc.)
Family Support
6.?What degree of involvement do your parents have in your choice of major?
Probe: What types of careers do they value?
7.?What do your parents do? Have their career choices influenced yours?
Probe: Are there any family influences?
Previous Research Experiences
8.?a) Have you had any previous experiences with research?
b) Can you describe those experiences?
Department Atmosphere
9.?I want to get a feel for how you interact with other students in CS&E. Can you characterize this for me?
Probe: Do you ever study in groups?
If so, what kind and why? How were they formed and why?
If not, why not?
10.?Do you spend any time in a computer lab?
a) If so, how much time do you spend in the lab? How would you describe the atmosphere in the lab?
Probe: Is it the type of atmosphere where you can ask others questions if you are having difficulties with whatever you are doing?
b) If not, where do you work?
11.?Do you belong to any CS&E committees or organizations? How did you get involved? Why did you get involved?
12.?Are there many women undergraduates in your department? How do you feel about this?
Classroom Behavior
13.?Describe the atmosphere of your typical CS&E class.
Probe: What is the class composition?
14.?How do you behave in the classroom setting? Has this changed over the course of your undergraduate education?
Probe: Do you ask questions and offer suggestions in class? Has the class composition and atmosphere influenced your behavior?
15.?Are performance standards in your department made clear to you? Do you know what you need to do in order to be considered a good student?
If so, how did you know this?
16.?How relevant do you view the information you learn in your CS&E classes to your future career plans?
Interaction with Faculty
17.?What types of interactions do you generally have with faculty members in your CS department?
18.?Do you talk with anyone in your department about your major or your career options?
Probe: Who? What have you discussed?
19.?Is there any faculty member in the department that you particularly identify with?
If so, why?
If not, why not?
20.?a) Are there many women faculty members in your department?
b) How do you feel about this?
Identification with Major
21.?What do you think it takes to be an academic computer scientist? A computer scientist in industry?
Probe: How do you see yourself relative to the descriptions you just gave?
22.?If you think about your long-term goals, how would you rank the importance of a career in CS&E?
a) If you give it a high rank, what do you feel you have to do in order to succeed in the career you chose? How does this fit with other interests?
b) If you give it a low rank, what ranks high for you?
Probe: How do family and career fit into this?
23.?Are there general characteristics of people who major in CS&E? If so, what are they? How do you fit in relative to those?
Probe: Do you see yourself as a computer scientist?
24.?Do you think that your experience would have been different if you were a man?
Future Plans
25.?At this point, do you have any plans for what to do after graduation?
26.?How does the mentor program "fit" into your goals?
{If they are planning to go to graduate school at some point}
27.?Why do you want to go to graduate school?
28.?How much do you feel you know about graduate school?
29.?Has anyone/thing influenced you in that decision?
30.?How certain are you that you will go to graduate school?
31.?What area are you planning to go into?
32.?What degree are you planning to get?
33.?What aspects of graduate school appeal to you?
34.?Do you have any concerns about graduate school?
35.?How will you find out about different graduate schools?
36.?What kinds of things are important to you in a school?
37.?Is there anything that has helped prepare you for graduate school?
{If they are planning to get a job}
38.?What kinds of things are important to you in a job?
39.?How will you find out about different jobs?
40.?What aspects of {this job} appeal to you?
41.?Do you have any concerns about {this job}?
42.?What are you hoping to get out of your job?
43.?Is there anything that has helped prepare you for {this job}?
Program Information
44.?How did you hear about the mentoring program?
45.?What aspects of the program motivated you to apply?
46.?a) What are you hoping to get out of your experience this summer?
b) Why are those things important to you?
Probe: Ask about research/mentor/university culture.
47.?Do you have any concerns about being in this program?
Probe: Why are these concerns? What do you think will happen if these thing you are concerned about do actually occur?
48.?Have you had any contact with your mentor? What was it?
49.?Do you feel like you need to prepare for the program?
Probe: Why do you feel this way?
50. ?How often do you expect/hope to see your mentor?
51.?a) How do you feel about the fact that all the mentors are women?
b) How do you feel about the fact that the program is only offered to female undergraduates?
Probe: Do you see any positive/negative aspects of each of the above? Has there been any reaction among your peers about the program??
52.?What would you have done this summer if you had not been in this program?
53.?Have you read the report or document for the students? What did you think about them?
Distributed Mentor Project Evaluation
Protocol for Second Interview with 1995 Student Participants
(Conducted 1 Year After Program Completion
)Post-Mentoring Program Impressions
1.?Looking back after a year, what stands out about your mentoring program experience? How would you describe the value of the mentoring program in your life today?
2.?As you look over the past year, are there any things (at school?) that you have approached differently because of your experience in the mentoring program?
Impact on Interaction with Peers
3.?I want to get a feel for how you interact with other students in CS&E. Can you characterize this for me? Has it always been this way? If so, what factors have influenced this change?
Probe: Do you study in groups? If so, what kind and why? How were they formed and why? If not, why?
Probe: If change has occurred, has the DMP had any effect?
4.?Do you spend any time in a computer lab? How would you describe the atmosphere in the lab?
Probe: Is it the type of atmosphere where you can ask others questions if you are having difficulties with whatever you are doing?
5.?Did you talk about your experiences last summer in the mentoring program with other CS&E students?
a) How did you describe it to them?
b) What were their reactions to your mentoring program experience?
Probe: Did you mention the female-only component of the program? Did males respond differently than females?
Probe: Did you give a talk about your mentoring program experience? How did it go?
Impact on Classroom Behavior
6.?Describe the atmosphere of your typical CS class. What is the class composition?
7.?How do you behave in the classroom setting? Has this changed over the course of your undergraduate education? What factors influenced this? Has the mentoring program had any effect?
Probe: Do you ask questions or offer suggestions in class? If the composition of ?your class was different would you behave differently?
8.?Did the mentoring program influence your commitment to your studies in CS? If so, how? If not, why?
Probe: Did it give them a sense of purpose, or context?
Impact on Interaction with Faculty
9.?What types of interactions do you generally have with faculty members in your CS department? Has there been a change in the types of interaction over the course of your undergraduate career? What factors influenced this?
Probe: Was the mentoring program an influence?
Research Impact
10.?Since the mentoring program, have you done or are you planning to do a research project?
If so, tell me about it. How did it come about? Was there any relationship between the mentoring program and your interest?
If not, why not?
11.?Have you applied to participate in any other summer research programs?
12.?Are there research topics you are interested in exploring now or in the future? How did you become interested in these topics?
Becoming a Computer Scientist: Fitting in
13.?What do you think it takes to be an academic computer scientist? A computer scientist in industry?
Probe: How do you see yourself relative to the descriptions you just gave?
14.?If you think about your long-term goals, how would you rank the importance of a career in CS&E?
a) If you give it a high rank, what do you feel you have to do in order to succeed in the career you chose? How does this fit with other interests?
Probe: Do you feel you would have to give anything up for your career?
b) If you give it a low rank, what ranks high for you?
c) Has the mentoring program influenced your ranking of a career in CS&E?
15.?Are there general characteristics of people you major in computer science? How do you fit in relative to those? Has this changed over the course of your undergraduate career? What factors have influenced this? Has the mentoring program influenced this?
Probe: Do you see yourself as a computer scientist?
16.?Do you think your experience as an undergraduate in CS&CE would have been different of you had been male?
Probe: Be explicit. Do male students have a different experience in CS&E than you do? Are there differences in classroom behavior? Finding study groups? Faculty interaction?
Career/Graduate School Expectations
17.?Did the mentoring program influence your perceptions of what you can accomplish?
If so, how?
Probe: Do you have different, or higher, career goals? (a teaching career vs. research career; choice of better graduate schools, etc.)
18.?At this point, what are your post-graduation plans?
a) If graduate school, when will you go? Have you applied? Has the mentoring program influenced your choice of whether to attend graduate school? ?If so, how? If not, why?
Probe: Do you feel prepared? If so, what has helped you?
b) If not graduate school, what will you do? Has the mentoring program influenced your choice of career? Will it help you achieve your career goals?
Post-Mentoring Program Contact: Forming a Network
19.?Have you communicated with your mentor since the program finished?
a) If so, what have you discussed? Who initiated the contact?
If it was the student, how did the mentor respond?
b) If not, why not?
c) Do you have plans to contact your mentor in the future? What for?
20.?Have you communicated with any other people who you met through the program? If so, what have you discussed?
Comments on Report
21.?Have you looked at the report by the LEAD Center?
If so, did it fit your experience?
If so, how?
If not, why not?
Distributed Mentor Project Evaluation
Protocol for Second Interview with 1995 Student Participants
(Conducted 1-4 Weeks After Program Completion)
Overview
1.?Overall, what stands out about the program for you?
2.?Did this program turn out to be what you had expected?
Research Aspect
3.?What kind of research does your mentor do?
4.?Tell me about the project that you worked on.
Probe: How much time did you have to spend preparing to work on a project?
5.?a) Who decided what you would work on?
b) Did you work on a single project throughout the summer?
c) Was your research part of a larger project?
6.?Did you work on your own, or with other people?
7.?What was the role of your mentor in the research project?
8.?a) When you had questions about the project, who did you turn to?
b) How available was that person to you?
9.?Did you finish the project this summer?
10.?What will you do with your research result for this project?
a) Will the results of your research be published, either on its own or as part of a larger project?
b) Before the program started, did you expect that you might end up with a publication?
11.?Do you feel that the work that you did this summer was important?
12.?Did you learn anything new about the process of doing research? If so, what? If not, why?
13.?Now that you've completed the summer, what are your feelings about research?
Probe: Is this what you expected?
Mentor Aspect
14.?a) Tell me about your relationship with your mentor.
b) Was this what you expected?
15.?How often did you see your mentor?
Probe: In what context did you see your mentor? (in a group once a week, socially, etc.)
16.?Did you talk to your mentor about her own experiences in graduate school and in her career?
If yes, was talking to her about those kinds of things an important part of the program for you?
If no, would you have liked to have talked about these kinds of things with your mentor?
17.?Would you want to be like your mentor?
18.?Was having a female mentor important to you?
If so, why?
If not, why not?
University Aspect
19.?a) Where were you living during the program?
b) Who arranged the housing?
c) Did you live with graduate students?
d) If yes, were any of them in your area?
20.?What do you think of the housing arrangements?
21.?a) Did you meet many graduate students? How?
b) What did you think of them?
c) What did you think of their experiences at the university?
22.?a) Did you meet many faculty members? How?
b) What did you think of them?
23.?What is your impression of graduate school?
24.?Has participating in this program changed your view of graduate school at all?
25.?What do you think of {this university} as a place to go to graduate school?
Overall Program
26.?Is there anything that would have made the program better for you?
27.?Is there anything that you wish you had known about the program before you started?
28.?Did this program affect your future career plans?
If so, how?
If not, why?
29.?Do you feel you can succeed in graduate school?
Distributed Mentor Project Evaluation
Interview Protocol for 1996 Mentors
Background
1.?Tell me a little bit about your academic career. How did you get into computer science?
2.?What has been your experience in helping undergraduates to do research?
3.?How would you define mentoring?
4.?What has been your experience in mentoring undergraduates?
Mentoring Program
5.?How did you hear about the mentoring program?
6.?What do you view as the purpose of the program? Why, if at all, was it important that it was open only for female undergraduates?
7.?Why did you get involved?
8.?a) What, if anything, did you expect to get out of your experience?
Probe: Was the goal to get a research assistant, or simply to help undergraduate women?
b) Why were those things important to you?
9.?a) Before the program started, did you have any concerns about participating?
b) Did those things happen?
10.?How did you interact with the student?
11.?How does your role as a mentor fit into your vision of the purpose of the program?
Research Aspect of Program
12.?What was your mentee like?
13.?Take me back to the beginning of the summer and walk me through how you got started.
a) How was is decided what the student would work on?
b) Why did you structure it that way?
Probe: Did the studentâs research fit into your research?
14.?What were your initial impressions of the student?
15.?a) Can you compare and contrast those impressions with your final impressions of the student?
b) In your opinion, what was the overall impact of the program on the student?
16.?How much time did you spend with this student? Was this what you expected?
17.?What role did you play in her research? Who supervised her research?
18.?{If someone else supervised the student}
Did {this person} volunteer to work with an undergraduate, or did you assign them? Probe: Why did you choose to have {this person} supervise the student?
19.?a) What were your meetings like?
Probe: Were they group meetings? One-on-one?
b) How often did you meet?
c) What part did the student play in your meetings?
d) What was the purpose of the meetings?
20.?Were there any pivotal moments or breakthroughs in the research?
If so, describe and explain what brought this about.
21.?How did the student interact with the other people she was working with? How did they relate?
22.?How did the other peopleâs roles (graduate students or undergrads working with the student) differ from your role?
23.?What did you think of the work that your student did?
Program Questions
24.?Having been involved in this program, what do you think of it?
25.?Why, if at all, do you think it is important for women to have this type of experience?
Probe: Are there issues of lack of confidence?
26.?What, if anything, could be improved about the program to benefit you or the student?
27.?Is ten weeks a long enough time for this program?
28.?Do you think that there are key elements for success in the program?
29.?a) Would you participate again?
b) If you did the program again, would you do anything differently?
30.?What advice would you give to someone who was considering participating in this program as a mentor?
31.?If a student was accepted into this program, how would you advise them to make the most of their summer experience?
32.?Do you recall reading the guidebook for a successful experience in this program?
If so, how helpful do you feel it was?
33.?Did you participate in the email discussion on Systers? What are your thoughts on the views expressed in that discussion?
34.?Were you aware of the email discussion forum for mentors involved in this program? If so, did you use it? Why or why not? If you used it, how did you use it?
35.?What is your departmentâs attitude toward your participation in this program?
Probe: Do you receive recognition? Would this be viewed favorably in a tenure decision?
36.?Are you aware that Anne Condon is sending or has sent a letter to someone in your department recognizing you for your participation in this program? What impact, if any, do you feel this letter might have?
37.?Is there anything else you would like to share with me about your experience in the program?