The UC Santa Barbara’s Graduate Scholars Program (GSP) seeks to provide support, mentoring and services for incoming graduate students from populations that are traditionally underrepresented in the academy, including students of color, first generation students, queer and nonbinary students. Scholars are paired with an advanced doctoral student mentor and receive a targeted orientation to campus resources, professional development opportunities and networking events across campus. Mentoring families meet monthly to discuss successes and challenges, and anything from departmental milestones to networking and funding. Other areas of focus include stress coping measures “All our journeys are different, so we shouldn't compare ourselves to others. And there isn't a set formula to ‘success,’ so we need to be kind to ourselves and give ourselves permission to celebrate all our accomplishments, to allow ourselves a maintainable work-life balance, to ignore the harsh criticisms and so on.” Vinnie says.