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Importance of undergrad research in area of grad school interest?


Bristayl
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My 11th grade dd has been doing undergraduate research at a biology lab at the local university where she is dual enrolled. She is enjoying it and so far the experience is confirming her interest in biological research as a career. However, she says she is more interested in translational/applied biomedical research long-term (the lab she is in is basic research in genetics/genomics). I realize she is young and could certainly change her mind, but my understanding is that research experience is perhaps the most important qualification for grad school in the biological sciences.

 

When considering potential colleges, I was wondering how much we should target colleges that look like they could provide undergraduate research opportunities that are more biomedical/translational. Opinions?

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I would also say that working in different labs can give different perspectives. It doesn't matter too much is it's summer experiences, research during college, etc, but different types of labs have different vibes. I did a summer internship at a university and loved it, and I had a great experience with the required year-long senior research project. I also enjoyed grad school as much as anybody can actually 'enjoy' that situation.

 

Then I got to my postdoc, and suddenly didn't like lab work any more. I realized that the work hadn't changed, but the environment had. Previously, I had been a places that had a real focus on training students - even as an undergrad, I was helping the newer-to-the-lab students, and as a grad student I had routinely been responsible for a couple of students. In a lab full of postdocs, there was no teaching, no newbie enthusiasm...and I realized that I liked the day-to-day experience of learning/teaching more than the research...and I got a job teaching at a community college.

 

In different labs, you also get a chance to see different types of research - some is more quantitative, some is more qualitative, some is big-picture, some is pinning down details - and it's good to get experience in seeing what it is that you actually enjoy.

 

That being said, getting into a big-name grad school can be very competitive, but getting into a grad school somewhere is not as hard (although getting funding might be, depending on how it's done in that particular department). As a first generation college student, it never even crossed my mind to consider grad school until I was a college junior. But, I was intent on learning, so I took more challenging electives than I needed and did a summer research internship, and those helped me get into a solid grad program. I think rather than looking at what would look good on a grad application, I'd focus on what would help her learn what she wants to learn. If she can write and talk about that with enthusiasm, she'll do well on grad school interviews. I know that when we brought in groups of grad school applicants, we had students from ivies, state schools, and SLACs, and all were able to do well in grad school.

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Ideally, students should pursue both, on-campus research at their home institution and REUs.  I don't know about the bio fields, but in physics, REUs are extremely competitive.  Having research experience at his home campus helped my ds be competitive for the REUs he applied to.  For physics, GPA, LOR, research (plus presentations/publications), GRE, and physics GRE are all part of the grad application.  

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I think a lot depends on the grad program too. In my case, the grad program I was applying to was only accepting a few students out of the hundreds since just a few labs had openings. The lab I wanted into was of a prof who felt my undergrad experience was exactly what she wanted for the next addition to her lab team. It was super competitive and came down to my experience matching what the prof whose lab was open wanted in her lab. I don't think my grades or test scores even mattered at all to be honest, although they were excellent. So I got in and it was all paid for and I received a stipend too to live off of. But, not all PhD programs work this way or are this intensely competetive. So I would say if it's a program that works differently and is accepting more students and they aren't required to have a lab accept them to even enter the program, then I would think there is a lot more leway. In my case the profs were just looking for who they wanted to add to their lab so if you were that person then you were in. But again, this was a PhD program only accepting a few people at that time and those accepted had their tuition paid for and were paid a stipend from the lab they got into so it would be completely different in something like a master's program or whatever.

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It can vary a lot even within a department. In my department, there were 2 divisions, and we rarely took classes together. In my division, we were admitted to the program and required to do rotations through 3 labs before settling into one - any given year, some labs might have more space than others, but we always had choices. In the other division, students applied to the department but were really applying to work with specific faculty, and they were admitted based on space in those labs. In those labs, I would expect that specific undergraduate experience was necessary.

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Thanks for all the helpful input, everyone. I was thinking of trying to give her the opportunity to explore what she believes she wants to do before investing herself in a PhD program as well as "looking good" for grad schools, although the latter is certainly a significant consideration.

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Thanks for all the helpful input, everyone. I was thinking of trying to give her the opportunity to explore what she believes she wants to do before investing herself in a PhD program as well as "looking good" for grad schools, although the latter is certainly a significant consideration.

Absolutely. My ds was uncertain what field of physics he wanted to pursue in grad school. He used research to help him narrow his areas of interest. REUs are the best way to participate in research areas not offered on your main campus. It is in the student's best interest to try become involved in research on campus in the various fields a available.

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For a student to have three strong letters of recommendation for grad school, the student should do research with three different advisers. This also will lead to seeing three different research fields and styles. This could be at one institution or multiple.

 

Emily

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On that topic, do you think that her PI from her research that she's doing now in high school will be too far in the past to ask for an LOR by the time she gets around to grad school applications? She will have worked with him for two years by the time she finishes high school.

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On that topic, do you think that her PI from her research that she's doing now in high school will be too far in the past to ask for an LOR by the time she gets around to grad school applications? She will have worked with him for two years by the time she finishes high school.

Absolutely yes. Her level of research responsibility should dramatically increase. She should be presenting posters and hopefully be published. Those mentors over that research are whom she ask for LORs.

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For a student to have three strong letters of recommendation for grad school, the student should do research with three different advisers. This also will lead to seeing three different research fields and styles. This could be at one institution or multiple.

 

This is one possibility, but not the only one. Some students work continuously in the same lab over several years; so if such an opportunity presents itself and she likes the research she is doing and is getting results and making progress, I would hesitate to recommend that she needs to switch just so she can work under another adviser. 

There are also other valid ways of gaining strong LORs. I for example regularly write grad school LORs for the students who work for me as tutors.

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My experience a million years ago was that they were more interested in the quality of the institution and the type of research you did versus the actual area. When I had my grad school interview for computer science, they said that they weren't interested if your job was troubleshooting computers, testing software, or analyzing simple data sets. If you had wrote significant software, done extensive data analysis, etc. etc., that was another matter. When I was a summer student I actually wrote the entire backend of a major software system and did data analysis that took several weeks for a published paper. The institution I worked for has an international reputation in my field. So my interview was basically just confirmation of what they already had and an opportunity to meet me. My dissertation research was in an entirely different area. 

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