asking to be mentored

[Miro]

There is a successful professor in another school who i really admire, her research topic, her teaching methods etc. But more importantly she is double minority ( female and black) in our field ( material science). I have only talked to her once at a conference however i have read a lot about her since wanted to get my PhD in her lab.

1. is it appropriate to ask her to me my mentor?

2. how do i approach her?

[rising_star]

You can't just out of the blue ask someone to mentor you. You need to build up a relationship with that person first. Have you continued corresponding with her? If not, try to build a relationship through email first, then maybe you can advance to phone/Skype conversations, and meeting at conferences.

[kaputzing]

1. Yes, but only if you have some sort of relationship with her already.

2. I think the best thing to do would be to start an email correspondence and try to catch her at additional conferences to chat.