For our undergraduate students, research at
Grand Valley really provides an opportunity
for them to actively engage in their learning.
So, it’s not just what happens within the
classroom but they come up with their own
hypothesis, their own argument, their own
idea and they can actively explore that outside
the classroom.
I just want to know what causes it and what
can I do to help treat it, to help prevent
it, to diagnose it early.
All of the things that come to make you more
of a complete scientist or artist, or musician,
or psychologist, that is what the research
can do here.
And yet I think the most important thing that
comes along with it, is the real confidence
that student gains.
When they can start to see, I can do this.
I actually can be a person that can strive
forward in my field and be successful.
I was really surprised that love played a
bigger role in polyamory than polygamy.
Research is really about asking questions
and looking for answers, and so it doesn’t
really need to have to happen in a lab, it
can happen in all kinds of context.
Whether it’s film or is media or literature,
right?
I want to do research on this particular author.
Or, themes in their writing, we start reframing
what research can mean when we ask different
questions, they get really excited about it
and so it’s a wonderful process to be a
part of.
Inside the unkept ones you can see larva of
different stages.
Students can get involved in research from
the moment in which they step on campus.
It can be anything from collecting data for
a faculty member’s research project.
It could be conducting their own research.
It could be for one semester all the way through
their academic career.
The choices are unlimited, it’s really up
to the students and their interests.
When it comes to doing your own research though,
it’s on your own time, and it takes that
discipline.
The experience of doing the research, of training
yourself or maybe disciplining yourself in
a way to think through a problem or an issue
scientifically can be extremely beneficial
and really, really applicable to almost any
context you find yourself in after you leave
Grand Valley.
I was able to go outside of my comfort zone,
go to another university and prove myself
there.
That the skills I’ve learned at Grand Valley
can be applied elsewhere.
I’m working with students who would love
to go to graduate school, who are expected
to have a demonstrated competency in certain
areas that they get working in the lab.
And so, it makes their application to a graduate
program better.
I’ll be starting my Ph.D. at Cornell this
fall.
So, I’m hoping to continue with the same
type of research.
I was a McNair scholar as an undergraduate
and being involved in undergraduate research
absolutely changed the course of my life.
So, I’m really, really invested in students
understanding how rewarding this process can
be.
Being an undergrad researcher at Grand Valley
has been the most life changing experience
of my entire life actually.
I’ve changed my career path because I want
to now go into research in a very specific
field, and I would never have known what area
of research to go into if I hadn’t been
exposed to so many different types of chemistry.
The people that really drive this are the
students.
They are the ones that drive the success in
their career.
I want you to contract this for one second,
hold, and go ahead.
Across the board, art, music, history, psychology,
math, engineering, all the sciences, there
is a lot of cutting edge work that’s done
here, and done with students.
And so that’s what’s outstanding about
Grand Valley.
