My kiddo who had no luck getting an REU last year, was just offered TWO REU positions:)
One dealing with grasshoppers and buffalo in Montana, and one at a Great Lakes research station studying fish.
She’d opted to go to Michigan and study fish because she could end up being a tertiary author on published research…and that would help with grad school. Plus…who doesn’t like to spend the summer at the lake?
Pretty neato:)
Anyone else’s kid get an exciting opportunity this summer?
Even if it’s just something simple…if they’re excited about it…go ahead and gush:) Fun to share their victories!
Back in the days, baby kiddo got an internship to shove volunteers into an fMRI… switched her major to neuroscience after that and have not looked back.
Back when the dinosaurs roamed the Earth, I got an internship to study the role of invertebrates in the formation of soils… Let me say that organic chem major looked so much better after chasing insects all summer long!
Bunsen: My kiddo will be identifying and cultivating benthic insects from stream bottoms, and studying the feeding habits of a couple of specific fish that eat them, providing a data set for a bigger project. She’s considering Entomology, Ecology and Forensic Entomology for grad school. She’s a third year MicroBio undergrad, currently.
There are few things as lovely as messing around in canoes and waders in lakes and streams:)
Mine did not, and now will probably have her tonsils out as she’s on her second round of strep this spring. So a job of babysitting or a fast food job, and a ‘vacation’ of ice cream for a week.
My D applied for about 15 summer internships in research in neuroscience, she was super excited had been researching them for over a year. Well, she didn’t get a single one. She’s very lucky that she received a scholarship at the end of her freshman year that is intended to fund experiences, internships and travel, etc. So she started emailing professors at multiple institutions that she could be self funded and she is interested in their research. She had a few skype interviews and now has an internship for the summer at Boston University! Yay! I’m so excited for her!
My dad grew up in Muskegon and Grand Rapids and I have fond (although faint) memories of trips to Western Michigan from when I was a child and we visited his mom and siblings.
cellomom…it’s not uncommon for Freshman to strike out with paid research positions. They’re crazy competitive, and the vast majority are given to juniors and seniors. Awesome she was able to push through to find her internship at Boston…that’s crazy ambitious for a freshman and will speak very well of her.
twoinandone…What a bummer! Poor kiddo! Sure hope her surgery goes well and she feels better soon:)
My son got an Amgen Scholar’s position at CalTech. He’s doing some research on fruit flies that I don’t understand but I think he’s basically helping on a project where he will be able to turn neuropathways on and off in living flies. He’s moving from rats to flies. He thought is would be better but apparently, the food that fruit flies eats ferments and smells bad. We plan to fly out to LA to visit once over the summer because I have a brother in San Diego and D will be attending an orientation at USC.
Well she’s a jr. but I know they’re really competitive, at least I know now haha!
She got the scholarship after her freshman year but it is recurring. I know many of the programs she applied for had hundreds of applicants for 20 or so spots.
@cellomom2, congrats to your daughter for being self-funded. My S14 did manual labor after his freshman year. After sophomore year, he still couldn’t find anything and basically “volunteered” for a position at Northwestern. They did eventually find some funding though.
S did a summer science/robotics program with kids after freshman year, just as he had the 2 prior summers. He got two research positions after sophomore year and chose the one that let him take off the month of July so he could travel to Taiwan with his sister and cousin. After JR year, he worked for NASA in the summer.
My daughter applied to seven internships. She got selected as an alternate for one, and got two offers. One offer was in biology education research and the other was in pharmacology research. She selected the second one and will be spending the summer in another part of the country working at a very well known research hospital along with 60 other interns. She is very excited. It took me several hours to get over the shock of her acceptance.
Lake Michigan is a beautiful place to spend the summer. You should plan a trip to visit her - and take your own side trip up (or down) the Lake Michigan coast!
So…camp is okay after freshman year. But a word of warning. My nephew took camp positions every year in college, and couldn’t find a job when he graduated 2 years ago. He cobbled together a couple part time positions, and has gone through a couple full time ones now that are not great stepping stones. He had a major with reasonable job prospects, but didn’t hustle to find any experience in the field. He got burned when he graduated and his competitors had some internships or related summer work.
^ I agree with you about camp. My older D had internships during the school year and headed right to grad school the summer following graduation. Camp would not be a good move for my younger kid, but for her sister it worked out nicely.
They will survive!