Research Mentors

Research Mentors

The term Mentor comes from the story of Odysseus. Before Odysseus sailed off to fight in the Trojan war, he left his son Telemachus with his wise friend Mentor to tend to the young man’s education. The choice was an excellent considering that Mentor was in reality Athena, the goddess of wisdom, in disguise. It is thus no small honor to be in a position as Mentor to a student.

By an odd linguistic coincidence, Mentor has the form of a word that means “One who ments,” where the verb “to ment” can be thought of as being some derivative of the word “mental.” It is thus not uncommon to refer to a personal teacher as a “mentor,” and to the student as a “mentee.” Despite the natural development of the term, I would prefer to designate a student participant in this program, not as a mentee, but rather as a Telemachus.