<p>Just looking for some of your guys' advice.</p>
<p>Over the summer this year, I did some research and came to some interesting hypotheses. I bounced it off a family friend (EE) and he thought they were worth researching and potentially profitable if patented and worked as described. I approached the local innovation center (sort of a tech startup) and they were impressed with my hypotheses and are currently working with me on getting some money and research together to see if they hold water...</p>
<p>Here's the problem. The NIIC (Northeast Indiana Innovation Center) is working on a timetable incompatible with my current situation. I'm applying for college next month (regular decision, december 31st), and need some help setting my application apart from the thousands of other qualified individuals. I feel I have something special to offer in terms of diversity to the campus, but have no way of conveying my hypotheses to the admissions faculty (and I seriously doubt their willingness to digest them). I've been recommended to contact a professor who specializes in the field and insist that I am seriously interested in undergraduate research and for them to be my mentor. I have no idea where to start in a situation like that</p>
<p>How would I find these professors and what would be the appropriate way to approach them at first?</p>
<p>Also, how large of a hook would this be for college admissions?</p>
<p>You would find professors specializing in a given field by using Google to find the appropriate department website and then browsing the faculty pages to see whose interests are closest.</p>
<p>Generally, many professors would not be very enthusiastic about a contact from a random applicant and might suspect that you are fishing for a hook. Nevertheless, even if they do blow you off, the costs to you are pretty low. To maximize your probability of being taken seriously, I would send a one or two paragraph description of the main idea and to ask whether the professor thinks this could potentially be promising and whether he has any thoughts or suggestions. Asking to do research at this stage would be premature -- just frame it as a consultation with an expert. If the professor is interested, he or she will write back and you can gauge the level of enthusiasm... at that point you may consider asking if the professor would be willing to oversee this kind of research, but only if the response is positive. Similarly, if the response is enthusiastic, you might consider asking at that point whether the professor might be willing to forward a copy of his or her opinion on the idea to the admissions office to increase your chances of being able to implement your plan.</p>
<p>The probability of success here seems to be pretty low... just to be realistic. I would suggest instead you send with your application a well written summary of your idea, accessible to the average Caltech faculty member (but not a specialist in the field). Also summarize what you've done so far. Each folder under serious consideration gets read by at least one professor, who will be able to consider your suggestion and who will sometimes forward it on to a colleague able to judge the research. That is a more likely way for your research to have an impact on your chances than to email professors. While it's generally true that most schools have admissions readers who are not able to judge the scientific merit of research etc. that you submit, Caltech is the exception. Most of the admissions reading is done by students and faculty!</p>
<p>Also, the fraction of students with a serious research interest at this point is lower than you think. So even showing evidence of a developed interest in something is already a plus. But how to quantify "how much of a hook" is hard, and it probably isn't very helpful to think in those terms.</p>
<p>Ben -- I had understood that if a student sends in a copy of his/her research as part of the application process, it would be read by a prof in the relevant department. Are you saying that this is not always the case?</p>
<p>In general, my feeling is that this didn't always happen when I was on the committee (04-06). Sometimes it would happen, but I don't think the routing was very systematic in that respect. I think there has been some effort since then to make it more systematic. If the research is clearly a make-or-break part of the applicant's file, then I think the admissions staff would make a bigger effort to direct it to an expert.</p>
<p>Ben,
The clear impression Caltech gave on the apps this year was that if someone did reserach, they wanted to see the paper! (This was fine by DS, by the way -- he is eager for someone who knows his field to read it!)</p>
<p>Just to be clear, Caltech definitely always wants to see the paper because that gives information and more information is always good. Moreover, each folder under serious consideration is always read by a professor. The only question is whether the professor is an expert in the field the student is interested in. That's the thing I can't vouch for... but certainly sending the paper will never hurt and will often help very substantially.</p>
<p>I applied EA and at the time of application I was currently working on an independent research paper so I decided not to submit it. Right now, with exception of a few grammatrical errors I probably need to clean up and whatnot, its finished. Is it too late for consideration with EA decisions if I were to send it now? I was just going to wait until the expected deferall for submission. This a good idea, or is it likely that they'll consider it for EA decisions?</p>
<p>I would send it in right now, assuming you clean it up so that you would be comfortable with a Caltech professor reading it. If it makes it into the folder in time for EA reading, great. If not, it'll be there for EA committee meetings and the RA round if you don't get in EA.</p>