<p>How much credit should you get if you complete a science fair research with help of some mentors? What happens if you really come up with something good? I've heard that professors usually just take your credit in undergrad research... What should it be like in High School??</p>
<p>you should get credit, as long as they were just ‘assisting you’ a bit.</p>
<p>The majority of high school students and beginning undergrads do not have enough knowledge to actually do “research.” If you do well in science fair competitions and the like, that will reflect well with colleges.</p>
<p>If you actually come up with something good (i.e. publishable), your professor should list you as a coauthor on any papers that come out of the research. You don’t have to do the majority of the work to be a coauthor, you just have to have made some good contribution. In the world of academia people work together on projects all the time (and generally all get credit for them), so professors won’t stoop to claiming credit for your work. Unless they’re very, very mean professors who like squashing promising careers in science by turning their students into cynical lab minions.</p>
<p>I’m a senior in HS and for my research, I had a mentor at a univeristy for a summer and got really good results. I have entered my work to the Siemens and Intel Competitions. I’m also submitting my paper to be published for several jounrals and a couple of conferences with me as the first author and my mentor as a co-author. So basically, if you do the work with a mentor, you should get most of the credit because it was your project.</p>
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<p>You do realize that you should only publish the same research in one journal, right? It’s even considered academically dishonest to submit your research to more than one journal at a time for the review process.</p>
<p>Also, if you’re just doing grunt work in the lab (washing test tubes, running experiments without any real knowledge of what’s going on, etc) you shouldn’t expect to be listed as a coauthor. You didn’t offer any real intellectual insights into the research being conducted, you were only doing as instructed. However, if you design experiments, choose what’s to be run, and have that sort of effort, you should be listed in the paper.</p>
<p>Sorry, what I meant by that is if my paper is rejected by some journal, that I will be submitting it to another, so I have it ready for a couple of journals. Sorry for the miscommunication. Now I realize that it made it seem as though I was trying to get it published several times. That is not what I meant. Sorry</p>
<p>Cool, but how did you manage to get in contact with those mentors? I’m trying to find one…maybe my professor…but I do not know how to ask and what to say, etc.</p>
<p>Well my school has a research program with a research coordinator who has many contacts at several universities. Also, there are some fellowships that some people apply for such as the Simon’s Fellowship at SUNY Stony Brook in NY. I would try looking at local universities if at all possible and check out what kind of research professors are doing. If something interests you or you have an idea for that professor to aid in his research, email him/ her and ask if you could conduct your research there w/ him/her as your mentor. I also know someone from my school who contacted a professor at Columbia just by e-mail about the professor’s research and soon he was asked to come in and visit. Eventually he was offered a place in the professor’s lab to conduct research with that professor and he eventually became a Siemens Regional Finalist and had his work published with him as the first author.
Good Luck!</p>