{"id":12090,"date":"2016-06-29T15:36:41","date_gmt":"2016-06-29T19:36:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/rinsfepscor\/?p=12090"},"modified":"2016-06-29T15:36:41","modified_gmt":"2016-06-29T19:36:41","slug":"surf-workshops-enhance-student-research-experience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/rinsfepscor\/2016\/06\/29\/surf-workshops-enhance-student-research-experience\/","title":{"rendered":"SURF workshops enhance student research experience"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Skye<\/a>
Skye Mor\u00e9t shows SURF students a sample of sketches from her research trips.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For 10 weeks, Rhode Island students accepted into the RI EPSCoR Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) program immerse themselves in an open-ended project guided by a faculty mentor.\u00a0Although home may be outside the Ocean State, the\u00a0undergraduates come from institutions of higher education in Rhode Island that are part of the EPSCoR community.<\/p>\n

The experience, supported by stipends and equipment funds, gives them a unique\u00a0opportunity to build on research skills and apply knowledge learned in class during the academic year. They work independently and in teams, gaining an appreciation and understanding of what it might be like to be a scientist.<\/p>\n

\"Skye<\/a>
In 2015, Skye Mor\u00e9t sailed on an Antarctic science cruise and created a data-encoded necklace with her sister, a jewelry designer. Mor\u00e9t explains the project here<\/a>.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As part of the SURF experience, students also gain access to a series of workshops aimed at\u00a0developing the professional skills demanded by their field and broadening their horizons, offering\u00a0new perspectives they may not have considered.<\/p>\n

One week, students took in a presentation from Christopher Hemme, bioinformatics core coordinator for Rhode Island INBRE<\/a>, and\u00a0Skye Mor\u00e9t<\/a>, who describes herself as a designer, scientists and adventurer. The next, they participated in a scientific poster design workshop at Rhode Island School of Design<\/a>, with\u00a0Nature Lab<\/a> Director Neal Overstrom offering insight on exhibit design and graphic designer Micah Barrett walking them through the finer details of scientific posters.<\/p>\n

The events drew student researchers from Rhode Island EPSCoR Track-1<\/a> and Track-2<\/a>, and Rhode Island INBRE.<\/p>\n

Jim Lemire, RI EPSCoR coordinator of undergraduate research, says the idea behind the Hemme and Mor\u00e9t presentations, and Mor\u00e9t’s\u00a0workshop that followed, was to expose\u00a0students to two different, but connected, avenues for processing the results of their research.<\/p>\n

“As data sets become increasingly complex and large,” Lemire explains, “it is good for the students to see that there are computational and analytical tools available to them. Even if they do not need such tools now, understanding a little about bioinformatics now may help them in the future.<\/p>\n

“Skye Mor\u00e9t’s presentation was really about showing the students how to take complex data sets and convert them into understandable, accurate, and appealing visuals. I also wanted the students to see another scientific career path and to understand that their scientific training has a broad set of applications.”<\/p>\n

After the presentation to a larger audience of about 100 students, a small group of about eight participated in a data workshop with\u00a0Mor\u00e9t. Using candy bars for\u00a0data,\u00a0Mor\u00e9t guided the students through an activity that had them considering novel ways to group and visualize findings.<\/p>\n

During the RISD design workshop, students broke into groups to first assess what worked and what didn’t about scientific posters and then put their newfound skills to use to\u00a0create their own.<\/p>\n

Lemire says he also hopes the students start to understand that there is more to their research than just experiments and data collection; that they have to be prepared to communicate their findings to a wide audience.<\/p>\n

Story and photos by Amy Dunkle<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Skye<\/a>
Skye Mor\u00e9t talks with SURF students about their “data.”<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Kiserian<\/a>
Kiserian Jackson, RWU, and Katie Nickles, URI, work through a data visualization exercise.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Stephanie<\/a>
Stephanie Hills, left, and Katie Heisler, both RWU, figure\u00a0out their data visualization strategy.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"data<\/a>
SURF students map out their candy data.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"poster<\/a>
Going old school with cut and paste poster design.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"poster<\/a>
SURF students assess the elements of their poster as they figure out their group design.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"poster<\/a>
Considering fonts and colors, leading and letter size, students gain new perspectives on design.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"poster<\/a>
Students weigh the pros and cons of poster elements after learning basic design strategy.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"poster<\/a>
RISD graphic designer Micah Barrett talks about design as students present their poster to the group.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For 10 weeks, Rhode Island students accepted into the RI EPSCoR Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) program immerse themselves in an open-ended project guided by a faculty mentor.\u00a0Although home may be outside the Ocean State, the\u00a0undergraduates come from institutions of higher education in Rhode Island that are part of the EPSCoR community. The experience, supported […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[21,1,54],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12090","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-uncategorized","category-undergrads"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/rinsfepscor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12090","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/rinsfepscor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/rinsfepscor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/rinsfepscor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/rinsfepscor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12090"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/rinsfepscor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12090\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/rinsfepscor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12090"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/rinsfepscor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12090"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/rinsfepscor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12090"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}