Done properly, mentoring engenders a lifetime commitment – on both sides.

There’s a difference between supervising and mentoring: supervising stops once somebody leaves the group, but mentoring never ends. 

Supervising someone means showing them how to work like a scientist, how to do the job and how things operate. But mentoring means helping someone to become a scientist. It goes beyond merely training them in the nuts and bolts of benchwork, and requires guiding their intellectual, philosophical, and emotional development. And like parenting biological children, when it’s done properly, mentoring implies a lifelong commitment. 

Your lab progeny are real progeny – your intellectual progeny. Science is unusual in that its pedigrees are formed not through blood but through adoption, but they are pedigrees all the same. And although some groups, regrettably, still seem to operate as though the group leader will get a pharaonic ending with all his servants put to death and buried alongside him in a massive pyramidal tomb (full of booby traps in case anyone tries to steal the lab secrets, of course), lab children should actually be treated with the same respect and affection that real children deserve. In intellectual terms, they’re going to inherit the farm and it’s they who will carry the family name forward. Let that name be a badge of pride, not a stigma.

Once somebody has joined a group, they should belong to it for life. That bond may weaken over time if either parent or offspring don’t tend it or feel they no longer need it, but it means always being there if called upon. It is an awesome responsibility, and what’s often forgotten is that just as with biological relationships, the commitment goes in both directions. 

So elders, keep in contact with your progeny, find out how they’re doing, and take an interest in their later careers. Check in on your kids and make sure they’re doing ok. No matter what you think, they have it harder than you did, and a lot of them will be struggling right now. They might have lost labs, lost grants, lost fellowships, lost postdoc positions, lost PhD positions, or, more simply, lost their dreams. 

And kids, treat your intellectual mentors like parents. Respect them, keep in contact with them, and show them that you value what they gave you. They might be getting on in years, they might have actual biological problems to deal with that aren’t anything to do with science. They too might be feeling the pain of cuts, of seeing their labs dwindle, and the ones that have done mentoring the right way, the ones who’ve cared about the scientists they’ve trained, will want to hear from you. 

We are a community and we should care for each other. Especially right now, when both scientists and the data-driven, fact-based worldview we represent are under attack as never before. People will be struggling. People are struggling. And people will get getting ready for a long campaign, preparing to defend that mindset against the ongoing assault. They might not show it, they might not be aware of it even, but it’s the right time to reach out to them and check that they’re doing ok. We’re all in this together, and we need to look after one another.

Dedicated in respect, admiration, and sorrow to SM, who I learned about too late.