Another lesson from an anti-mentor

In addition to being flexible, another lesson I have learned from an anti-mentor (people who have mentoring styles that cause you to vow never to mentor students in that way) is that students’ time is valuable.  As such, they deserve a professor’s full attention during meetings.  Professors should not check e-mail or answer the phone during meetings.  Finally, if a student wants to arrange a meeting, professors should do so rather than telling the student to “stop by during office hours” when there is likely to be a line of students waiting for a meeting because they were told the same thing.