Mentor
At the heart of the program is a dynamic team of ophthalmologist mentors who guide underrepresented in medicine (UIM) students on the path to becoming competitive ophthalmology residency applicants. Each mentor is matched one-on-one with a student whom they guide through medical school and, ideally, applying to ophthalmology residency. Therefore, mentorship is a commitment of several years. As a mentor, we ask that you:
- Communicate by phone, video chat, email or in person with your mentee three to four times each year and more frequently when needed
- Work to establish trust and a relationship with your mentee
- Identify specific reasons why your mentee is interested in ophthalmology and encourage their exploration
- Make introductions to other ophthalmologists as needed
- Encourage and support mentee with medical school success and residency application preparation
- Communicate with program staff to provide program feedback and if additional assistance is needed to support your mentee
Complete the online interest form to be a mentor for the program.
Champion
The Minority Ophthalmology Mentoring program seeks to have at least one faculty member at each medical school who serves as a Champion. The Champion plays an important role at our medical students’ home institution. As a Champion, we ask that you:
- Facilitate shadowing opportunities in your department for our medical students
- Assist our medical students in identifying potential ophthalmic research opportunities
- Seek opportunities to speak to UIM medical students at your university about the Minority Ophthalmology Mentoring program. We will supply you with presentations, hand-outs, etc.
- Help our medical students identify university-based funding support to attend the Academy’s annual meeting and/or other ophthalmologic conferences.
- Help identify and promote the program to first-year medical students who are underrepresented in medicine to apply to our program.
If you would like to share information about the program with interested students, we encourage you to use our recruitment toolkit which includes flyers, sample social media posts, emails and presentations.
To check whether your medical school has a Minority Ophthalmology Mentoring program Champion or to sign-up, contact
mentoring@aao.org.
Academic Coach
Academic coaches are paired with program students by June and work with students throughout the application process to assess strength of the candidacy. These volunteers are medical educators and ophthalmologists who work closely with medical students and residents and/or knowledgeable about the match process. They work with students and provide advice throughout the match cycle in the following ways:
- Work with students to develop a personalized plan and strategy for residency application;
- Provide counsel around letters of recommendation;
- Application review including personal statement, essays, and CV; and,
- Mock interview support
If you have questions or would like additional information, please contact mentoring@aao.org.