Undergraduate Research
Section 6
Undergraduate research allows students to integrate and reinforce chemistry knowledge from their formal course work, to further develop their scientific and professional skills, and to create new scientific knowledge. Conducting undergraduate research in close collaboration with a faculty mentor allows a student to draw on faculty expertise. Such research should be well-defined, stand a reasonable chance of completion in the allotted time, apply, and develop an understanding of in-depth concepts, use a variety of instrumentation and methods, promote awareness of advanced scientific practice, and be thoroughly grounded in the chemical literature. Overall, the research project should be viewed as a component of a publication in a peer-reviewed journal.
Critical Requirements
- Research must be well-defined, apply and develop an understanding of in-depth concepts, promote awareness of safety, be grounded in literature, and contribute new knowledge to the discipline.
- For programs where research is required to meet the lab hour or in-depth course requirement, all students must prepare a well-written, comprehensive, and well-documented research report that has been evaluated by department faculty.
- The report must include safety considerations where appropriate and thorough and current references to peer-reviewed literature.
- If credit in summer or off campus research is used to meet the lab hour or in-depth course requirement, then students must prepare a written report following the guidelines above.
Normal Expectations
- Research should be envisioned as a component of a publication in a peer-reviewed journal or technical report.
- Research progress would be presented at an institutional or local meeting.
- Programs should have a standard rubric for assessing undergraduate research reports.
Markers of Excellence
- Research contributions would result in a co-authorship of a peer-reviewed publication.
- Research would be presented at a regional or national chemistry meeting.
- A research project involves multiple semesters or years with students gaining increasing independence and scientific sophistication.
