A major initiative by the LSA Committee on Gender Equity in Linguistics (COGEL) is our Pop-Up Mentoring Program (PUMP). It is a series of events that travel around from conference to conference, giving anyone who is interested a chance to have a brief meeting with a mentor outside of their official support system. In recent years, events have taken place both in person and online.

This program is based on a successful “speed mentoring” program that has been run for many years by the American Psychosomatic Society, and is modeled after similar events organized by Women in Cognitive Science (WiCS). There are several ground rules for this program:

1. This is a one-time session (i.e., the mentor is not signing on for a longer-term mentoring relationship);
2. The mentee should come with a specific question or two to guide the session and make the most of it;
3. The mentee should send the mentor some information about themselves and their question(s) ahead of time, but not expect that the mentor will have read this information prior to the meeting.

Additional information for mentors and mentees can be found here. 

If you are interested in being a mentor, please complete the Mentor signup form

If you are interested in being mentored, please complete the Mentee signup form

Once mentors are secured, mentors and mentees will be matched based on general interest area by a PUMP coordinator.

PUMP events are open to all, regardless of gender or career stage! 

For more information about becoming a mentor or mentee, or if you are interested in hosting a pop-up mentoring event at your next conference, please contact COGEL member Jessica Rett ([email protected]), and she will coordinate with the rest of our PUMP team. Additional information for conference organizers can be found here.