What do you get when you combine presentations and posters from student in 27 disciplines, on topics as diverse as “Organic farming as protest in Thailand,” “Metacognitive illusions in monkeys,” and “Quantifying chloride ion runoff in the Genesee River”?
A “mindboggling” display of undergraduate research, as President Joel Seligman described it after spending time talking to students last Friday at the College’s annual Undergraduate Research Exposition.
The energy in the room reminded Steve Manly, director of undergraduate research, of a lunch he had with Wolfgang Ketterle, not long after the Nobel Prize-winning physicist led one of the first groups to realize the Bose-Einstein condensate.
“Now what?” Manly recalled asking Ketterle, and then described how “his eyes got big, and he got all animated. ‘Well, now we’re going to prod it and kick it and hit it with a laser . . .’ ”
Manly said Ketterle’s infectious enthusiasm reminded him of “an eight-year-old in a sandbox.”
And so it is at the expo. “This is a celebration of discovery by students trying to find their paths to their own sandboxes, and of the people helping them along their way.” Manly said. “It’s a celebration of the soul of what this place is about, the research and the teaching and the just having fun in doing all that exploration.”
Students received the following awards for undergraduate research in the humanities, engineering, natural sciences, and social sciences:
President’s Awards
Jennifer Dombroski ’16 (linguistics); Madeleine Laitz ’16 (chemical engineering); Md. Tanveer Karim ’16 (physics and astronomy); and Kate Cowie-Haskell ’16 (anthropology).
Deans’ Awards
Angela Remus ’16 (international relations and Spanish) and Nicola Francesco Tavella ’17 (women’s studies and health, behavior, and society); Sarah Bjornland ’17 (optical engineering) and Andrew Stern ’16 (electrical and computer engineering); Kelsey Csumitta ’17 (brain and cognitive sciences and psychology) and Alicia Wei ’18 (neuroscience and mathematics); and Katherine Brown ’17 (American Sign Language and Psychology), Myranda Steingraeber ’17 (neuroscience), and Chiziterem Onyekwere ’17 (health, behavior, and society).
Professors’ Choice Awards
Pedro Piñera ’16 (studio art and art and art history); Jonathan Boualavong ’16 T5 ’17 (biomedical engineering); Ashley Bui ’17 (brain and cognitive sciences and psychology); Julia Iourinets ’16 (neuroscience), Amy Elias ’16 (molecular genetics), Larisa Bainton ’16 (vocal performance), and Emily Rowe ’16 (brain and cognitive sciences and psychology).
Seligman urged all the students to “stay your whole life, eight years old in the sandbox. Keep the sense of curiosity and wonder. Keep the joy of ‘excelsior, I found something.’ That’s what makes life so special.”
Students weren’t the only ones in the spotlight. Exceptional faculty members who have been particularly inspirational in helping young researchers find their “sandboxes” were recognized with Students’ Association Professor of the Year Awards.
They are: Kirt Komocki, senior lecturer in Spanish in the Department of Modern Languages and Cultures; Laurel Carney, professor of biomedical engineering; David Goldfarb, professor of biology; and Stuart Jordan, senior lecturer in political science.
