Chair: Tiffany Buda & Laura Coyle

Chair Elect: Tabitha Schepker

Contact: mentorship@vadcoordinator.org

Considering being a Mentor or Mentee?

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Mission

The Mentorship Committee offers the MCS Community quality support that leads to professional growth and independence. Our philosophy involves collaboration with those we serve: VAD patients, multidisciplinary VAD teams, communities, and professional organizations. And it is with this we continue to collaborate and foster the mentoring program in working dyads to innovate, energize, and offer support to all action multidisciplinary team members of ICCAC. Growth, empowerment, and sharing of ideas is extremely important to ICCAC and these goals are reflected in our mentoring program.

2023 Goals

• Connect 12 dyads
• Build a “bank” of > 25 mentors
• Execute introductory virtual meetings with mentor/mentee and a mentorship co-chair 
• Administer, collect and evaluate 3 month and 12 month surveys
• Coordinate and execute quarterly mentorship webinars
• Continue communication and outreach of mentorship committee
• Provide programmatic structure, goals, expectations for successful dyads
• Implement travel grant to connect successful dyads

ICCAC Mentorship Program Expectations

• Upon applying as a mentee please allow approximately 4 weeks to be appropriately paired with a mentor
• Open enrollment for all mentor/mentee dyads will be quarterly beginning in either January, April, July, or October  
• Mentors will be rotated based on the requests of the mentee and paired appropriately by interest(s)
• If more than (1) mentor meets the request of a mentee the mentors will be chosen in order of application submission beginning 2.15.23 and/or pulled from a lottery and subsequent mentors will be given an opportunity before serving a 2^nd time
• If more than (1) mentee meets the request of a mentor, the mentee will be paired in the order of application submission beginning 2.15.23
• Initial virtual visits are expected to occur within the first two weeks of each open enrollment period
• An invitation for the initial virtual visit between mentor/mentee will be sent out and conducted by one of the mentorship co-chairs and include the following:
  1. Discussion regarding goals and skills you’d like to achieve or obtain by working with your mentor. Please be as specific as possible.
  2. Setting boundaries and expectations
     • Identify approximate meeting dates, times, and platform(s)
     • Acceptable methods of communication and response times
     • Coming prepared with questions and/or topics for discussion
     • Avoid directly asking a mentor to share policies or protocols
  3. Expectations and completion of a successful mentor/mentee dyad
     • Identify a minimum of one goal to achieve in the program
     • Meet as a mentorship pair at least once every 2-3 months for a 12-month period for a minimum of (4) times for approximately a 60-minute period
     • Recommend attending all (4) mentorship webinars
     • Required to attend a minimum of (2) mentorship webinars
     • Log all dates and time spent in mentoring hours
     • Complete the 3-month survey and 12-month evaluation at the end of the program
     • Verbal agreement to follow through on 12-month dyad commitment and mutually agreed upon travel grant location if dyad deemed successful
     • Submit log, webinars attended, surveys, and agreed upon meeting place to be considered for a travel grant to meet your mentor in-person
  4. Travel grant opportunities for mentor/mentee to meet in person at their respective institutions or at an agreed upon ICCAC networking event held in conjunction with a national or international conference upon completion of a successful dyad
     • 1-2 Travel grants award per calendar year beginning in 2024
     • Successful dyads will be announced in December during the 4^th quarter of each calendar year
     • The names of each successful dyad will be entered into a random lottery and chosen in front of board and committee members at the ICCAC annual board meeting OR live during the 1^st Mentorship Meeting of each calendar year in the event the board does not convene in-person in January
     • Reimbursement for airport parking, flight (national $600, international 2K, hotel (Hilton Honors or convention/conference related hotel 3 day maximum), taxi to hotel and return to airport, and conference registration if required will need to be approved by mentorship committee chairs and paid for upfront by the awardee and submitted after reimbursement after attendance to the event to ICCAC treasurer with proof of attendance and/or receipts