When people discuss undergraduate research, they generally focus entirely around the benefits for students. These experiences are widely recognized to build critical-thinking skills, foster a foundation for the scientific process and create hands-on classroom experiences.
Although true, this mind-set undervalues undergraduate research as a catalyst for the advancement of scientific knowledge.
Some in the scientific community have a skeptical view of undergraduate research. They may not doubt the benefits it offers students, but for true scientific innovation, it’s best to leave that to the flagships.
Such biases could not be more misguided. For example, a recent study by Michelle Kovarik, an assistant professor at Trinity College, documented 52 articles by primarily undergraduate institutions between 2009 and 2015 that made advances throughout analytical chemistry such as in spectroscopy, microfluidics and electrochemistry.
And a special issue of Polyhedron last August, edited by Robert LaDuca, Jared Paul and George Christou, presented over 60 articles that were based on undergraduate research and that reported scientific advances throughout inorganic chemistry.
Last year at Bucknell University, we surveyed the h-index, which measures the citations and influence of a scholar’s publications, of chemistry faculty from 22 highly selective undergraduate institutions to determine the impact of their research. We saw that assistant professors commonly had values between five and 15, with associate and full professors often increasing to high teens and even 20s, with a few faculty members even higher. Moreover, those are systematically low scores since we based them off a core collection (ISI Web of Science) to ensure reliable values. This limited sampling of significant research impacts points to much broader accomplishments by undergraduate institutions.
Read full article at: https://www.insidehighered.com/views/2017/07/07/undervaluation-role-undergraduate-research-advancement-scientific-knowledge-essay
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