Mentor a year of real research.
One high school student, one year, one project you shape together. Our mentors are UC Davis undergraduates, graduate students, postdocs, and faculty. If you do research here, you qualify.
The commitment
Wednesdays, 3 to 5 pm, on campus, through the school year, plus a little prep. You see your student through start to finish: from picking a question in the fall to their poster at the spring Science Fair.
Why do it
It's real mentoring experience, the kind that belongs on a CV, in a fellowship application, or in a grant's broader-impacts section. It comes with a community of mentors from departments across campus. And the students go further than you'd expect: last year four of them presented at the international fair in Panama, and one took first place overall.
Before you start
Four steps, all done before you work with students: a background check (fingerprinting via LiveScan), California mandated-reporter training, a short program-safety training, and a signed code of conduct. The trainings are online, and we walk you through every step.
Questions first? The FAQ has a mentor section, or email us.
Our mentors
EnvironMentors runs on UC Davis scientists who volunteer their time, all year, one-on-one with a high school student. These are the people who make it happen.
2025–26
- Gal Koss Ag & Resource Economics
- Lucas Hornung Atmospheric Science
- Emilie Changeux Environmental Studies / Food Systems
- Eloise Dresser Environmental Policy / GIS
- Connor Tumelty Plant Biology
- David Mitchell Ecology
- Maya Shydlowski Soil Science
- Kekoa Nelson Restoration & Fire Ecology
- Lewis Daniel Horticulture & Agronomy
- Marie Klein Plant Genetics (postdoc)
- Matt Davis Plant Genetics
- Shabnam Shabnam Plant Nutrition
2024–25
Our pilot year was guided by nine graduate-student mentors: Meranda Corona, Gal Koss, Erica Varga, Dario Falcone, Connor Tumelty, Matt Davis, Shabnam Shabnam, Julissa Bautista, and Maya Shydlowski.
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