Mentor-the-Mentor: Clinical Research

Updated 8/25/2025

Mentorship is essential for junior investigators to achieve research success, and increases the odds of earning subsequent extramural funding. Strong research mentors have active programs, research funding, recent publications and an interest in fostering faculty scholar programs.

Typically, scholars complete self-assessments, including an Individual Development Plan, and set goals for the year. They then work with their mentor team in implementing and reporting their progress as well as challenges. Please see resources (Self Assessment, IDP, and Reporting).

Mentor Compact/ Mentorship Agreement

Once scholars select a mentor team, both mentors and scholars agree to expectations about meetings, timely feedback, and program activities that contribute to the faculty scholar development. A formal mentorship agreement can be helpful in outlining these roles and expectations.

• Mentorship Agreement

Clinical research programs work to address common mentor-mentee goals, such as:

Clinical Research Resources for Mentors

Mentors may wish to direct their faculty scholars to a variety of resources for clinical research: 

IPPCR. The NIH Introduction to the Principles and Practice of Clinical Research (IPPCR) course trains participants on how to effectively and safely conduct clinical research (website). The course highlights biostatistical and epidemiologic methods, study design, protocol preparation, patient monitoring, quality assurance, ethical and legal issues, and much more. This online course is offered annually at no cost. 

• A Certificate of Completion is awarded to each registered participant who achieves a score of 80% or higher on the final exam.
• If you do not wish to enroll in the course, you can still view the individual course lectures through the NIH IPPCR YouTube Playlist or the NIH VideoCast website. Please refer to the course syllabus for the order of lectures.

ACRP. Access to Association of Clinical Research Professionals (ACRP) clinical research training is available at no cost to GW and MFA participants to enhance the quality and safety of our clinical and translational research.

• Available to GW and MFA faculty and staff working on human subject studies
• Courses are online and self-paced
• Training is provided at no cost to our teams
• Recommended courses (here) vary by role on study as coordinators, managers & PIs
• About 15 hours to complete, or researchers can demonstrate mastery

To register, visit the ACRP website and enter your GW email address. NOTE: This training is offered through a partnership with Children's National Hospital so you will need to select them as your organization. You will then be able to set up a password and login to your account.

K New Investigator Workshops are held third Thursday at 4PM, and cover topics important to clinician researchers. The schedule and archived sessions are available here.

GW course work. Didactic coursework in epidemiology, biostatistics, mixed methods, machine learning, etc are available at GW (here). Faculty may be able to register as non-degree students, and use their tuition benefits to complete these courses. 

RCR. Responsible Conduct of Research is a hallmark of any researcher, and ranges from mandatory CITI training (here) to refresher workshops. Children’s National Hospital holds refresher workshops for faculty third Thursdays at 3 pm (here). GW Office of Vice President for Research offers refresher workshops (here).

Professional Development Resources for Mentors 

Mentorship also has its challenges! Explore faculty scholar and experienced mentor resolutions to common mentorship challenges.

The Center for Faculty Excellence at SMHS (here). Recent workshops include topics “Effective Mentoring: Strategies for cultivating an effective mentor-mentee relationship”; “Feedback that Sticks: Techniques for giving feedback and helping those receiving it”; “Creating an Environment of Psychological Safety: Strategies for fostering a climate in which people are comfortable expressing themselves and sharing concerns”; “Aligning Goals and Expectations”; “Mentoring Across Differences,” among others.