PUMP is a mentoring program open to all incoming freshmen; students from diverse backgrounds, however, are especially encouraged to join. Freshmen who participate fill out a brief questionnaire on their own background and rank the qualities they would most like to have in common with their prospective mentor. For example, a Hispanic student interested in law could request a mentor of the same ethnicity with similar interests. Once the match is made, students are placed with their mentors in groups, called PUMP families, made up of students from different racial groups to facilitate cross-cultural interaction. Ethnicity and race are heavily emphasized by PUMP, regardless of whether students want race or ethnicity to be an important factor in the assignment of their mentors. Participating students are also placed in their mentor's racial affinity program. For example, students with black mentors are placed in the Black Student Union's Leadership and Mentoring Program.
The University was wise to make use of existing infrastructure to get PUMP off the ground. By tailoring mentorship to students' own interests and drawing on a broader pool of mentors, PUMP expands and improves upon what is already a successful system.
In the coming years, PUMP should aspire to better accommodate students from all backgrounds and all interests by becoming an independent organization in its own right and not just an amalgamation of existing programs. PUMP should emphasize cross-cultural interaction since promoting such interactions is not the core goal of PUMP's constituent organizations.
PUMP's registration questionnaire ensures that students whose racial or ethnic identity is important to them would be matched with a mentor of the same racial or ethnic group. PUMP's current constituent organizations would benefit from this system, since students of color whose racial identity is important to them would be paired with upperclassmen who would likely turn their mentees on to the campus' racial affinity organizations.
PUMP has the potential to greatly improve all students' freshman experiences. In the coming years, we hope PUMP will grow beyond its current constituent groups to form a dynamic and flexible organization that is greater than the sum of its parts.
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