<p>
That’s certainly a fair question, and I think it varies quite a bit. In general, the further along you are (and consequently the stronger your background) the more likely you are to be doing non-menial things. </p>
<p>Caltech does it’s best to avoid grunt labor, however. Most of the opportunities for summer work is through what’s called a SURF (<a href=“http://www.surf.caltech.edu/[/url]”>www.surf.caltech.edu/</a>), and they really want undergraduate students to have their own, independent project for the summer. They basically want students working on research where it’s feasible that they can become a first or second author in a reputable journal. If you’re really interested, I can PM you a copy of my SURF proposal (in chemical physics) as a gauge of what I think theyre looking for. Now, even though students have their own little project doesnt necessarily mean its not grunt work some projects, well require grunt work, but the idea is that it wont ALL be grunt work, and that students are active in all phases of the research and should have the possibility of coming out with nice results!</p>
<p>Some of the undergraduate research work is published in a journal Caltech has called CURJ. They post their issues online (<a href=“http://www.curj.caltech.edu/archive.php[/url]”>www.curj.caltech.edu/archive.php</a>), and if you browse through a few issues you should get an indication of what undergraduate students are doing. </p>
<p>Also, I may have been over-doing it a bit when I said one email you usually have to go talk to the professor as well, or at least I did, lol.</p>