<p>I keep reading that people do “research” as an extracurricular activity. What is the point of this; do these high school kids without a formal education actually accomplish anything? I want to know if these kids are undertaking a systematic investigation of the effect of selective chemical modifications of polyethylenimine on its efficiency as a vector for plasmid DNA delivery into mammalian cells OR if they’re just washing out test tubes at the community college. This is coming from a kid who spent all summer doing odd jobs and messing around on the computer.</p>
<p>Maybe this will help:</p>
<p><a href=“Siemens Foundation - Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) strategy - Siemens USA”>http://www.siemens-foundation.org/competition/2005/2005CarnegieMellon.htm</a></p>
<p>Or how about:</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.siemens-foundation.org/2005Berkeley.htm[/url]”>http://www.siemens-foundation.org/2005Berkeley.htm</a></p>
<p>You don’t necessarily need a <em>formal</em> education to accomplish something. I know I learned much of what I needed to know for my own project from scientific journals.</p>
<p>These kids are undertaking a systematic investigation of the effect of selective chemical modifications of polyethylenimine on its efficiency as a vector for plasmid DNA delivery into mammalian cells.</p>
<p>They have mentors? Weak. I want to see a kid who isn’t Chinese without a mentor find a way to inhibit Cd4 glycoprotein receptor sites on helper T cells without effecting immunological response, until then…I’m not impressed…</p>
<p>Have you actually done a research project with a mentor? A good mentor will NOT hand-hold you (as if he or she actually had time to do so).</p>
<p>i’ve never done any research and frankly I wouldn’t know where to start. There are a couple d3 and one good d2 universities around here though, would I just walk into some professors office and ask if I could do research?</p>
<p>No.</p>
<p>First you’d send them an e-mail.</p>
<p>Then they’d ask you to stop by.</p>
<p>Then you’d do exactly just that and hopefully impress them with your credentials.</p>
<p>Then you’d get your own project to work on for much of the summer.</p>
<p>And mayhaps take a week off for college visits (yay Cambridge!).</p>
<p>That’s how things went for me in a nutshell.</p>
<p>Would it be too late if I’m going to start school in 2 days and I’ll be a senior?</p>
<p>It’s never too late.</p>
<p>As far as apps go, if you don’t have anything interesting to report by the time you apply, you could always send in an update by mid-February (“My research project on the eighty-seventh protein in the XYZ cascade is going swimmingly, etc.”) :)</p>
<p>Awesome, I will definitely look into it. Thanks mollie and krypton</p>
<p>Yeah, and 90% of professors won’t even respond, they already have enough on their hands. I would suggest cooking up something on your own first, develop it, and then do a write up on it. Professors look for extremely self-motivated kids. </p>
<p>Oh, and I definetely wouldn’t do it just for the college apps, it’s not worth it just for college.</p>
<p>Indeed; research is hard enough when you do enjoy it, let alone when you don’t.</p>
<p>I made a mini biodiesel refinery in my garage. Now my parents cars, which both run on diesel, run on oil from Burger King. It wasn’t all that hard, I just read a few books on it and had to scrounge up a bunch of barrels and pumps. The only expense I have now is the methanol which only costs me $2.75/gallon. I don’t think this counts as “research” but would it look good on a college app?</p>
<p>I loved the research I did during high school, and it’s the only thing that really help me in college. The skills I got from there allowed me to get a pretty well paid job in labs without having to start out washing glasswares. And I get more time to learn new experiments. My mentor was terrific. It’s hard to start our research without a Ph.D. but even most graduate students need someone to find a research topic for themselves. It just take some academic reading to understand all the stuff. </p>
<p>It’s fun. I mean, I went in there with an idea that I was the most stupid person there. So, I had my mind open to learn. There are advanced high school kids or undergrads but hardly any of them know more than the postdocs. If given the project, you can do it, understand it fully and get a good discussion out of it, good job.</p>
<p>If you’re doing research for college or doing activities for college, then research isn’t for you. However, if creating that mini biodiesel refinery in your garage really interested you, then you can show your interest for it through your essay. </p>
<p>I must admit, research is something that teaches you skills you don’t get in a normal classroom. You have to think for yourself, be able to communicate your ideas towards professors, and it’s really up to you whether your research gets anywhere.</p>
<p>It looks like you really want to do something, but don’t do it for college. By making the mini biodiesel refinery, you have already established the first step to research. Reading and doing projects that have already been done to see if they actually work. If you’re really interested in biodiesel, you could take your refinery to the next step and see if you could undertaking a systematic investigation of the effect of selective chemical modifications of polyethylenimine on its efficiency as a vector for plasmid DNA delivery into mammalian cells. (Take your biodiesel to a higher level and do some research with it)</p>
<p>If you have any questions, PM me, I’ve worked with biodiesel. I won’t tell you too much because I’m still working on it too. ;)</p>
<p>
There is an optional(?) essay on the MIT app which asks you to describe something you have made – this sounds like a great candidate for that essay.</p>
<p>It’s not really the structure of the research/invention/innovation that’s important (in applications and in life), it’s the way you learn how to think and approach problems.</p>