| Abstract: | Little is known about the impact of university-situated science mentoring programs on the affect of high achieving high school students, and few science mentorship programs have been described. This study describes a university-based summer science mentorship program designed to offer participants a challenging science research experience and identifies issues that influence the affective outcomes for participants. Interview data was collected from eight participants at the 2nd and 6th weeks of participation. Student responses were summarized and iteratively searched to identify patterns within the responses for each interview. It was found that mentors played a crucial role in framing the participants' experience and influencing their affect and that careful selection and timing of research projects was critical to participants' attitude of learning and accomplishment. The implications for science mentorship program developers and for research are discussed. |
