How should I gain quantifiable achievements within a research internship?

Career Opportunities & Internships
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Hello wonderful people who clicked on this thread. So I’m going to be interning at one of the assistant professor’s labs at Mount Sinai this summer (i contacted him personally), and while im reaaaallly excited to be working there for a couple of weeks (anywhere between 6 to 9 weeks) it just dawned on me what specific, quantifiable achievements i want to gain from this internship. The assistant professor has been published numerous times in really prestigious journals (science, cell, nature, etc.), and, idk, i just need some advice as to what i should try and gain from the internship other than experience. A rec letter to get into future labs? A poster that I could present at a research conference? Do you think that during my internship I’ll be able to develop my own really strong research paper under the assistant professor’s (or lab’s) guidance/mentorship (or will i more likely end up just working for the lab)? Or, if even possible, get a citation on one of the assistant professor’s (the lab’s) papers?.. Any advice/help would be greatly appreciated, thanks peeps.

Also, would presenting a poster at a relatively well-known conference be a good achievement and stuffs, thanks again

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i forgot to mention im in high school too (idk if that makes a difference, but yeah)

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So, having done something similar, I would try to be pretty laid-back and conservative about what you think you’ll accomplish. Not saying that you won’t accomplish a lot – hopefully you will! – but part of being able to experience research as a high school student is realizing what doing research is actually like, and it’s not quite that easy.

This also depends on what you’re researching, what kind of science background you have, and how many hours per week you’re in the lab. The best way to know is to ask, honestly – just shoot them a casual email and say you’re excited to know more!

Anyway, it really depends on the lab; some are more accustomed to summer interns than others. For example, some might give you your own independent mini-project to work on (which is ideal, since it’s the best way to immerse yourself in the field and it’s also super cool), but others might treat you more like a lab assistant (meaning that you’ll have to prepare solutions, take care of any animals they use, run errands, etc).

If it’s the second case, that’s still great experience! You can still put it on your resume/college apps/etc and it’s an important part of research, since somebody has to do those jobs eventually.

Hopefully, though, it’ll be the first case, since that’s what you seem to be looking for. Again, I don’t know you or the lab, so maybe you’re some kind of child prodigy and I have no clue. But for the average student researcher, here’s sort of a reality check:

  • You might write a paper, but you probably won’t publish it, at least not in a real journal. They will not cite you on one of their papers. I’m sorry. Still, you can put it on college apps if it’s unpublished or even with no paper at all!
  • Writing a scientific paper is not like writing an essay or even a HS lab report. There’s a very specific style and set of standards, and even reading a true scientific paper is hard if you don’t know what you’re doing.
  • If you’re not working there full-time or at least 20 hrs/week, you probably won’t write a paper. That’s because lab research is hard and slow. If you could make a big discovery in 6 weeks, we’d have cured cancer by now. That’s really the key to an internship – learning what the job is truly like. That doesn’t mean it’s not fun or that you won’t learn stuff, it’s just not like what you’re probably envisioning. (Seriously, I thought I had a good idea and I was still shocked.)
  • If you are interning full-time, be warned that working 8 hour days is, um, hard, especially if you’re doing a lot of standing and physical work.
  • Some labs will make you work really hard; some won’t. Personally, I worked really hard and loved it, but other kids I knew went home early every day and loved it too. Just roll with it, or else you’ll end up unhappy, and you want this to be a positive experience. :slight_smile:
  • You will not be going to a research conference unless your lab goes to one on campus and take you along. But that’s ok! If you pursue science as a career, it’ll happen someday.
  • Alternatively, you could investigate the possibility of presenting at a local science fair, depending on the project. You should also reasonably expect to get a good letter of rec from the person you’re working with (which may be a grad student or an assistant professor, but it sounds like it’s a big lab so it probably won’t be the main professor). You may even be able to continue your research in the school year or next summer, which would be awesome!

Despite all that stuff, I don’t want to discourage you at all because it should be a really exciting experience! You just need to be flexible and reasonable about what you can do in one summer. Don’t show up expecting anything, because it’ll just make you frustrated if/when it doesn’t happen. I know on CC it seems like everyone has these amazing research experiences with published papers etc, but 99.9% of people don’t. Actually, 99% of HS students probably don’t even have internships, so you’re already way ahead! Have fun with it and be open to whatever they ask you to do.

Omg, I just realized this is a SUPER long post, but like I said I did something similar over the summer and I get really excited talking about it, I guess.

Btw, what are you researching?

Tl;dr: Research is awesome but different than what you’re picturing, positive attitude and work ethic are key, don’t expect many “concrete” accomplishments because you are really just gaining experience (and trust me, that’s enough)

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I stg, the internet can be such a great place sometimes. thank u soooo much for the advice, i really do appreciate every bit of it. i feel waay less confused about all this stuff now. and to your question asking what i’m researching, i really would love to answer it as im really excited for it, but since i already detailed how the mentor is an assistant professor, and the specific school he works at, along with my name in my username, iiiiiidk if im completely comfortable saying it (im just paranoid i guess idk lmao). thanks for the advice tho, it definitely has given me some clarity. <3<3<3

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Oh yeah I totally agree, I almost put what I researched but then I realized it would be waaay too specific – no worries!! Anyway, I hope you have an awesome time!! It’s great that you’re already thinking about it now; they’ll probably be super impressed with how prepared you are! What grade are you in in HS?

One last thing: usually most labs will have one main professor (called the PI, or principal investigator) in charge with other people/assistant professors/grad students underneath them working on related projects. It took me an embarassingly long time to figure out what PI stood for, so yeah.

Also, basically every professor will have been published in journals like Nature since it’s essentially their job, so it’s obviously a huge accomplishment but you don’t need to feel, like, excessively intimidated if you know what I mean.
Mt. Sinai is really well-known though so I’m sure whatever you’re doing will be really cool!

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To your question, rn im a sophomore in high school. and thank god u explained what a PI is, i had seen the term used before on some website and i just couldn’t figure it out. lmao, saved me from a lot of future confusion.