<p>I am a rising junior, and I heard other people had helped at local colleges with research, It sounds cool, How would I go about doing this, I really just want to volunteer at the lab, and help out with simple stuff, not like conduct a study. What time of year is best for this, School is starting soon, and I am only free like 3:30-6:00 for September-october, do you think I should still send E-mails to local professors to see if they need help, or are they off work by then? Also My lab experience would be limited to what I learned in Bio H and Chem H. Any advice is appreciated.</p>
<p>I would start calling, e-mailing local universities, and set up appointments. Luckily at my school, Juniors (select few) have an opportunity to intern at a biomedical research lab for cancer, and this is done every year.</p>
<p>Ask your HS science teachers if they have any suggestions or contacts you can follow-up. Also try science-related civic organizations, ecology and nature groups, nutrition and health clinics, your garbage, water, and electrical utility companies, local and regional government, Red Cross, etc. Many organizations like that have staff scientists that might be persuaded to take on volunteer help.</p>
<p>I say go for it! I know several people (myself included) who emailed professors at our local university and got research/internship positions. One of my friends even gets paid $12 an hour interning for a bio-engineering prof. Definitely send out emails ASAP! Sometimes professors might pair you up with a grad student and you’ll be able to help him/her out instead.</p>
<p>Look specifically for internships and ask those professors if they know of any. I interned at a cancer research lab under a prominent cancer researcher and conducted novel research. Research is so much better than just being “the help”.</p>
<p>Does helping out with research help at all in college admissions, like does it count as an extracurricular, and does it even matter to top tier schools?</p>
<p>Yes, it counts as an extracurricular and yes, it matters to top schools. It gives you a bigger boost if you can get your name onto a paper/poster presentation versus just “helping out”. Of course, such things are not your choice, but either way, it helps.</p>
<p>I sent out emails to a seven professors and one responded that they would forward it to the whole bio department, do you think that is enough? I’ve heard of some people who sent out like 70 emails, to get only a few back.</p>
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<p>I’m impressed. I only sent it to forty when I was looking for a mentor for Siemens.</p>
<p>But in my opinion, doing research in a lab is over rated. Your basement is the best lab. I went to ISEF on a project done in my kitchen.</p>
<p>Research in a lab does give you the opportunity to use legit lab equipment that would otherwise be really hard to obtain.</p>
<p>I did research this summer and I did it through my local hospital. Check with any local hospitals around you, perhaps?</p>
<p>I’ve been looking for a topic to research, any ideas? I’m interested in epigenetics, oncology, and diseases</p>
<p>To do the type of high caliber research that will be impressive to top tier schools, you really should be doing it in a lab - I don’t see how you would do so otherwise. For instance, I did research on glioma and glioma cell migratory mechanisms. I don’t see how you could culture cells (much less how you would get them in the first place), in your basement. The culture medium ran $500 a container and I went through at least two in a summer! That type of research requires something like an internship to provide funding. The American Cancer Society funded my internship and I was able to get a paper out of it and that definitely impressed colleges. I didn’t even have to enter any competitions.</p>
<p>So are you saying that just helping with someone’s research wouldn’t be impressive at all at top tier schools? What if I got my name on one of their papers?</p>
<p>And what if you worked in a team of college students and the professor, but didn’t get your name in the paper?</p>
<p>You have to find a way to show the school that you actually did work on the project. Many students “intern” at labs and all they get to do is clean equipment and some “busy work”. Either A) Get your name on a publication (which is very hard for a high school student - I was third author on a paper but it wasn’t accepted for publication) or B) Get a letter of recommendation from the PI that says something along the lines of “Student contributed significantly to this project and was an integral part of the team”. Without that, how would you show the college that you did actual intellectual work and not just busy work?</p>