Build Effective Mentorship Ecosystems: Oct 19–22, 2026

Where the science of mentoring meets the people who practice it.

Mentoring flourishes as an ecosystem, not as a single relationship. This October, the Mentoring Institute at The University of New Mexico welcomes more than 500 scholars, practitioners, and program leaders from around the world to Albuquerque to explore how high-quality developmental relationships, grounded in emotional intelligence and positive psychology, advance individual growth, organizational performance, and community wellbeing.

Across four days, you will choose from more than 150 peer-reviewed concurrent presentations, learn from nine plenary speakers of international standing, sharpen your skills in two intensive pre-conference workshops, and begin each morning in a facilitated learning circle with colleagues. You will leave with evidence-based strategies you can apply the moment you return to your campus, organization, or community.

Whether you teach, lead, study, advise, or build programs, you belong here. Faculty, staff, students, researchers, K–12 educators, administrators, and community, nonprofit, and government leaders gather at this conference to learn from one another and build a professional network that continues to grow long after the closing session.

Register here now!

View the full conference schedule

Tuition Remission Available for UNM and HSC Eligible Employees

What You Will Gain

• Strategies you can use immediately. Evidence-based practices and program models drawn from more than 150 peer-reviewed presentations, ready to adapt to your own setting.
• Direct access to the field’s leading voices. Conversations with researchers and practitioners shaping the science of mentorship ecosystems.
• Hands-on skill development. Six hours of intensive training in emotional intelligence and positive psychology or in program design, management, and evaluation through the optional pre-conference workshops.
• Time to reflect on your own practice. Daily learning circles that guide you from connecting with the conference theme to applying it through action in your own mentoring relationships.
• A global community of colleagues. Relationships across disciplines, sectors, and institutions that continue to support your work throughout the year.

Reserve your place today and join a global community that believes mentoring helps people and institutions flourish.

Workshop Leaders

Pre-Conference Workshops: Monday, October 19, 8:00–11:00 am and 2:00–5:00 pm

Begin the week with six hours of focused, hands-on training from two of the most respected voices in the field. Workshops require separate registration; choose one of two options:

• Emotional Intelligence and Positive Psychology Within a Mentoring Ecosystem
  Bob Garvey   The Lio Partnership
• Designing, Managing, and Evaluating Mentoring Programs
  Laura Lunsford   Novant Health

Plenary Speakers

Plenary Sessions: Monday through Thursday, 11:00 am and 1:00 pm; Wednesday, 2:00 pm

Nine plenary sessions bring leading researchers and practitioners to the main stage, where they will share innovative approaches to mentoring, coaching, and leadership across academic, organizational, and community settings.

• Opening Remarks: Building Effective Mentorship Ecosystems
  Bob Garvey   The Lio Partnership
• Designing Mentoring Ecosystems Employing the Science of Positive Communities
  Peter Mather   Ohio University
• Human-at-the-Helm: Using AI to Support Not Replace Mentors
  Jean E. Rhodes   University of Massachusetts Boston
• Transformational Mentorship as the Infrastructure of Flourishing
  Keith Walker   University of Saskatchewan
• Building Mentorship Systems That Last: Lessons From 15 Years of Mentoring Boys and Young Males
  Victor B. Sáenz   University of Texas at Austin
• Head, Heart, and Gut: The Biology of Transformative Mentoring
  Imandeep Grewal   Eastern Michigan University
  Johnetta Ricks   Eastern Michigan University
• Beyond Mentoring: Designing Earning Ecosystems That Make Human Potential Impossible to Underutilize
  Lisa Fain   Center for Mentoring Excellence
• Teaching Investigators to Build Their Own Mentorship Ecosystem
  Maritza Salazar Campo   University of California, Irvine
• Building Leaders Through Developmental Mentoring Relationships
  Sonya Hayes   University of Tennessee, Knoxville

Facilitated Learning Sessions

Learning Circles: Tuesday through Thursday, 8:00 am

Begin each conference day in conversation. Dr. Dionne Clabaugh will guide three facilitated learning circles that move from connecting with the conference theme, to leveraging it, to applying it through action in your own mentoring practice.

• Learning Circles
  Dionne Clabaugh   Angle 4 Solutions

Join us to increase your understanding of

Mentoring Evidence-Based Effective Practices

in academia and the workplace.

Register here now!

View the full conference schedule

Registration closes Friday, October 9, 2026.

We look forward to welcoming you to Albuquerque.