Defining Research Projects, by Susan Urban, Texas Tech University
From CISEREUPI
- Idea: Students come into a group with different technical backgrounds. Even with predefined projects, it may be necessary to scale back or enhance projects even further to match student skills with projects. Projects also need constant monitoring for success.
- Objective: To define a research project that can be completed in the 8-10 week time frame, give the student a sense of accomplishment, and lead to some form of dissemination.
- Assessment of skills before students arrive
- Reassessment of skills in person after they arrive in the context of specific projects. For students with weaker background, may need to cut the scope of the project. For students with stronger backgrounds, don't set the bar too low. Encourage creativity and original contributions.
- Having undergraduates work with teams, but with well-defined tasks within the team (accountability for their specific contributions)
- Assigning undergraduate teams to graduate mentors and training graduate mentors to understand the importance of the role they play.
- Students working alone
- Matching undergraduates with graduate students that don't understand the importance of mentorship.
- Uncommitted faculty mentors
- Rigid projects
