By Douglas Esser
Andrea Stone mentors students not only as an assistant professor and a substance-use researcher in the School of Nursing & Health Studies (SNHS) but also as the faculty instructor for the student research journal at University of Washington Bothell.
For her multiple mentorships, Stone was selected for the Chancellor’s Undergraduate Research & Creative Practice Mentor of the Year Award.
“So many of the UW Bothell faculty serve as mentors, it’s difficult to single one out, but Andrea Stone rose to the top,” said Chancellor Wolf Yeigh, noting her record of teaching, research and helping students publish. “Hers is a degree of community engagement and connected learning — some of our core values — that few match.”
Experiences with impact
Stone has been with UW Bothell since 2007, initially in the School of Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences, moving in 2013 to SNHS.
As faculty, she teaches research and epidemiology — the study of health outcomes in populations. As a psychiatric and drug dependence epidemiologist, Stone researches mental health and substance use, especially nicotine and cannabis use among youth. And as the faculty member for The Campus Research and Observational Writings (CROW), she is instrumental in helping publish the peer-review journal for UW Bothell students.
In all this work, Stone sees mentoring as an opportunity to serve as a guide for her students.
“On The CROW, on research and in my class,” she said, “my mentoring is done through providing opportunities for experience.”
The experiences, in turn, help students think about what they may want to do next in school or what careers they may want to pursue after graduation.
“I’ve been thrilled over the course of my time here to have students come up to me after the course is over and say, ‘I didn’t know what I wanted to do in health, but now I know I want to do epidemiology; I want to do research,’” she said.
For her research on cannabis use, for example, Stone has students helping collect data and review the literature. And, in conjunction with IAS Associate Professor Shauna Carlisle, Stone mentors students researching disparities in health outcomes associated with racial discrimination.
Stone took on The CROW in 2014. It’s unusual because it’s a class, a club and a product. Stone co-instructs with Erick Echols, the manager of UW Bothell’s Writing & Communication Center. She meets weekly with the editorial board.
“The students make all the decisions. I’m very happy to give them guidance and have discussion about papers, but they’re the ones making the decisions,” Stone said.
From pain to pride
Anny Smith, left, a senior in Health Studies graduating in June, said one of her toughest assignments was writing a research proposal — and one of her greatest achievements was having it published in The CROW.
“It was really empowering that this thing that gave me so much pain and grief was one of my personal accomplishments and something I was really proud of,” said Smith, who became a member of The CROW editorial board.
Hearing from students that she’s having that impact is the biggest mentorship award, said Stone.
“That’s pretty cool actually to get that feedback,” she said. “To me, that’s mentorship.”
