BSPP Plant Health Club ‘Mentoring inexperienced researchers’

Following the success of last years meeting, Gail Preston will again lead a workshop that will provide advice for researchers who are involved in mentoring inexperienced researchers, such as students involved in summer research internships, honours research projects or masters projects. It is particularly targeted towards postdoctoral researchers, graduate students and other research staff who are involved in the day-to-day supervision and mentoring of inexperienced researchers. We will discuss various aspects of mentoring for students involved in diverse types of research.

• Planning
• Training approaches
• Time-management
• Giving feedback
• Self-evaluation
• Inclusive mentoring of students from diverse backgrounds

BSPP Chair: Gail Preston, University of Oxford and BSPP President Elect

Co Chair: David Read, Forestry and Agricultural Biotechnology Institute (FABI) at the University of Pretoria, South Africa and BSPP Ambassador

Prof. Gail Preston (Department of Plant Sciences, University of Oxford)

Prof. Gail Preston is a Lecturer in Plant-Microbe Interactions, Director of the BBSRC-funded Oxford Interdisciplinary Bioscience Doctoral Training Partnership at the University of Oxford and Deputy Director of the University of Oxford’s Doctoral Training Centre. https://preston.web.ox.ac.uk/

She developed a fascination for plant pathology while studying Natural Sciences at the University of Cambridge. She studied for her doctorate under the inspiring mentorship of Prof. Alan Collmer at Cornell University, where she began to ask questions about the biology of plant pathogens that still inform her research today. How do environmental factors regulate pathogenicity and virulence mechanisms? How do pathogens manipulate the microenvironment inside host tissues? How does the environment inside and outside plants affect disease development?