Advancing professional skills in undergraduate students: Faculty-student mentorship

Abstract

In 2019, three faculty—a psychology professor and two faculty librarians—at Cal Poly Pomona (CPP), collaborated on an open pedagogical project to provide a hands-on experience for undergraduates taking a psychology course, Program Evaluation (PSY 4430/A).1 Taught by Michael Giang from CPP’s Psychology department, the Program Evaluation course was designed not only to teach students about research designs, methods, analysis, assessment, and communication strategies to improve social and organizational issues, but also to help build the students’ résumés with real-life experiences of collaborating with professionals across campus to improve current programs. The two of us mentored and worked with Giang’s student teams that were tasked to evaluate the library’s APA citation workshop.