<p>Well, I’m not going to do it solely because it looks good for my resume’. I started this topic because I really had no idea what it was. It has made me curious, though. Thanks for the help so far, everyone.</p>
<p>D. was hired as lab Assistant at local university while in HS for couple summers. She will be intern at med. research lab at her school starting next year. She just contacted Lab, went thru interview, they liked that she already had experience which is very similar to what she will be doing. The first was paid job, the second is not paid, which is OK, since she has a very good job at her school working for Chem. prof.</p>
<p>Med schools that emphasize research like to see people with research experience and who are naturally curious. For med schools that emphasize community service, research is nice but it’s not absolutely necessary.</p>
<p>Research is spending your summer (or at Stanford, to get Honors in a subject, you have to do research) in the lab of someone. Science people usually think of it as behind a bunch of test tubes. Law people think of it as in a library.
Usually for research “to count”, you have to have a paper published. As first or second author.</p>
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<p>You can do it during the school year too.</p>
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<p>While publications help, they are by no means necessary for reseach “to count.” Research that does not results in a publication is still valuable, both as a learning experience and for admissions.</p>
<p>Medical schools like research because there is such a thing as a physician-researcher – physicians who conduct biomedical research to enrich the field. In addition, even if you never become a researcher, knowing how research is conducted will enrich your practice. You will know how to look through medical journals for the cutting-edge research in your field and will keep current on new technologies that will better serve your patients. Research is what keeps the field of medicine relevant, and without physicians who are invested in research, we’d still be stuck in early 1800s medicine.</p>
<p>There are a lot of ways to do it – you can do it during your summer or your school year. Generally it involves going to a professor who’s research in whihc you are interested and asking if they need a research assistant. There are also formal research programs that are sponsored by different universities and organizations – the National Science Foundation has a lot, called “Research Experience for Undergraduates” (REUs). Many large academic medical centers have programs for undergrads to shadow doctors and do research over the summer. Search for “Summer undergraduate research fellowship” or something akin to that on Google.</p>
<p>Also…like bluedevilmike has, you do not need publications to “count” research. The vast majority of undergraduates will never publish a paper, certainly not a first or second-authored paper.</p>