Program Introduction/Background

The pathway to a degree in Science, Technology, Engineering, Math, and Medicine (STEMM) is complex, featuring multiple entry and exit points. Barriers to degree completion disproportionately affect students from historically marginalized groups, especially those with limited experience or cultural familiarity with academic institutions. To address these challenges, we developed MedWork, a one-year mentorship program designed for high school students aspiring to STEMM careers. The program’s innovative long-term mentor-mentee relationships provide sustained support, enabling mentees to build meaningful connections and grow their professional network over time. MedWork breaks down physical and institutional barriers by connecting mentors and mentees worldwide via a purpose-built online platform, MentorCity. Unlike standard video conferencing tools, MentorCity offers a secure, integrated environment for communication, data collection, and relationship/goal tracking. Additionally, our small-group mentorship model fosters personalized, goal-oriented development. Our program has completed training content creation, recruitment, and enrollment for its pilot year.  
 

Relevance to ASPBP

MedWork emphasizes a mutual learning model to foster the professional development of both mentors and mentees. We have developed in-house training modules designed for easy adaptation by other mentorship programs. Additionally, programs seeking to establish or enhance their mentorship structures may find the MentorCity platform especially valuable for providing secure, scalable, and effective virtual mentorship. This presentation will focus on sharing experiences, materials, and structures of an online mentorship program to support ASPBP members interested in development or adaptation of analogous initiatives.  
 

Target Population

MedWork provides mentorship programming for high school students. MedWork mentors are STEM professionals, clinicians, graduate, or health professional students.  
 

Lessons learned

While MedWork is in its inaugural year, these lessons will guide future iterations of MedWork and may serve as a foundation for other organizations looking to build inclusive, virtual STEMM mentorship programs. 

• Structured training modules are foundational: These modules have helped standardize the onboarding experience while allowing flexibility for diverse learner needs. These modules provide professional development for both mentors and mentees 
• Use of a centralized platform for events: The platform serves as a centralized hub for all mentoring activities including matching participants, scheduling meetings, facilitating safe communication, goal setting, collecting feedback, and storing evaluation data. This integrated approach reduces logistical complexity.  
• Recruitment challenges: Recruitment relies on leveraging professional networks and community partnerships to ensure diverse program participants.  
• Transferability across contexts: Our training materials, mentorship framework, and evaluation strategies are readily customizable for different populations and goals. Materials used in this program may be used by others to reduce administrative work in creating these materials.