<p>How do you do research?</p>
<p>the person next to me says: you meet someone at a conference who's done a really neat paper on a topic that interests you, you talk to them over several beers about how their idea is nice but totally unuseful to what you want to do, then on the back of a paper you don't like, you sketch out ways to extend their idea to work they way you need it to. then you split up and make division of labor happen, so that one person goes and runs the experiment, and the other goes and scours the literature like you should've before you even started to make sure someone else hasn't already done it. then the experiment is over, hopefully with unexpected results. voila, research. then you write a paper, emphasizing how your results are completely unlike anything anyone's ever done before, and also that it's nowhere near useful enough to adequately solve the problem, and thus you should continue to be funded. then you submit said paper to many conferences and it gets rejected, until finally someone accepts it in a dazed and confused moment. then you go to another conference and start all over again.</p>
<p>that's the grownup, working-in-the-real-world-almost, version of research. if you want to know how me the undergrad does research, i'll tell you tomorrow. and if you want to know how you, the high school student, does research, well i have no ****in clue, b/c i didn't do that sort of thing when i was in high school.</p>
<p>Hmm, do you mean "how is research actually performed" or "how does one go about getting a research position"?</p>
<p>I meant how does one go about getting a research position?</p>
<p>In short, lots of people do it throught established summer research programs (RSI et al.). Many others read through information on college websites for schools near their homes, find professors whose work they find interesting and email the professor stating their background and interest and asking if there are any research positions avaliable in the lab for high school/college students.</p>
<p>What are some other summer programs where you can complete research?</p>
<p>Summer programs that provide research opportunities are in general not genuine research</p>
<p>I say this because the ones I heard of is that they either make you do conventional lab techniques or you have one advisor teaching dozens of students at the same time. In the end, nothing much comes out of this research.</p>
<p>I'm assuming the type of research you are talking about it Intel competition quality. For that you first need a topic, some knowledge, and a lab to house your work, a mentor/ advisor willing to work and guide you, and a lot of free time(summer is a good time). You find something extradionary, or interesting, and you submit your work to the competition.</p>
<p>If you're of a biomedical science persuasion, you can do research at the National Institutes of Health for a summer as a high school student.</p>
<p>I did it the summer after my freshman year of college, and it's scads of fun. It's competitive to get in, but I would imagine significantly less competitive than RSI, etc.</p>
<p>Oh, and wrt to
[quote]
they either make you do conventional lab techniques or you have one advisor teaching dozens of students at the same time. In the end, nothing much comes out of this research.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Well... if you've never done research before, I'm not sure how you can get away with not learning "conventional lab techniques." </p>
<p>And learning your way around a lab doesn't preclude doing exciting/relevant research -- the work I did during my first semester as UROP here is currently being reviewed for publication in one of the best journals in biology.</p>
<p>For National Institutes of Health is it necessary to live near the laboratory? What if you live on the west coast?</p>
<p>Well, presumably you find housing. I lived in a dorm at GWU, and other schools open up their dorms for summer renters too. I'm not sure if the out-of-town high schoolers had a special living arrangement (like I said, I did the program as a college student, so I had to find housing on my own).</p>
<p>Of course, this assumes that your parents will let you go halfway across the country to live on your own freshman year (mine certainly wouldn't have!).</p>
<p>Website is here: <a href="http://www.training.nih.gov/student/internship/internship.asp%5B/url%5D">http://www.training.nih.gov/student/internship/internship.asp</a></p>
<p>Ugh, I meant "...assumes your parents will let you go halfway across the country as a high schooler..."</p>
<p>The Boston weather is frying my neurons...</p>