<p>My son is trying to figure out if and how he should submit a copy of a research abstract he had published in a scientific journal. I'm thinking he should just mail it because neither one of us have been able to find the correct info on the website. Some schools, like U Chicago, specify to do it through the online portal for arts supplements, but since WU doesn't say that, I'm afraid it would get lost. Any ideas?</p>
<p>I would contact his application processor, or better yet his regional director, who will be the first one to read his application. </p>
<p>You can find his specific application processor by logging onto the WUSTL Pathway. As for the regional director I’m not sure - I would
guess online, and if not there ask the guidance office at school for the representative they have on file. He also might have received a business card if he/she visited his HS and he met with her. </p>
<p>Obviously, with the app due in a little over a week, I would do this as soon as possible. Just ask them if submitting the article would be beneficial and if so, how to go about it. </p>
<p>Best of luck!</p>
<p>Hi, I contacted my regional admissions officer who told me that it would be best to mail in my abstract to WUSTL’s admissions address under the “Contact Us” section of the website.</p>
<p>Arris and LK, thank you!</p>
<p>Is it best to send only the abstract or the report?</p>
<p>@Sculpting I would not recommend doing so unless he is the first author. It could otherwise be considered plagiarism. I submitted mine because, well, I am the first author.</p>
<p>You must also recognize that the admissions officers neither have the credentials nor the time to actually understand most research abstracts.</p>
<p>jlee4001, how did you submit your abstract? Mailed or e-mailed it in?</p>
<p>@4beardolls I personally do not recommend doing this. I was in constant contact with my admission counselor about my research and its significance; however, he merely understood that it was very very important but nothing more (not the actual science or anything). I would have recommended submitting your abstract as the Moog Fellowship essay response. That’s what I did. Under my honors/awards section I listed my first authorship.</p>
<p>jlee4001, thanks. My son did not submit his abstract. He talked about it in his Moog application but did not include his abstract.</p>
<p>@4beardolls would you mind PMing me his abstract? I’ll send you mine.</p>
<p>Why didn’t he use it as his Moog essay though? I’m sure it would’ve made for an excellent one!</p>
<p>In an earlier post it was suggested that using an abstract for which a student is not first author would be considered plagiarism. That is not true. Any researcher’s curriculum vitae will include all abstracts in which the researcher is listed as a contributor. Admissions officers are smart enough to know science is a collaborative effort, and also to understand the specific order of contributors listed. For future reference, If a student has his or her name on an abstract, use it somewhere in your application. In my son’s case, he was first author on both of his, so there was no confusion, but I wanted to make sure others reading this thread didn’t walk away with incorrect information.</p>
<p>@Scultping the Moog Fellowship essay prompt asks students to discuss their projects “in a manner that will permit the Moog Committee to assess your own contributions.” Thus it would be wrong for a student who is not the first author to submit his/her mentor’s abstract as his/her own. Is that not plagiarism? </p>
<p>Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk</p>
<p>Having worked as both a researcher and as an adjunct for a few years, I thought I had something worthwhile to add, but now that I’ve said what I wanted to say, I’m done. Jlee, I wish you all the best in your endeavors. The world can never have too many researchers who are passionate about science.</p>
<p>If one wants to submit an abstract supplementally, I would advise him/her to highlight his/her own contributions unless he/she is first author. First author is all-encompassing, if you will. You can’t be accused of any form of plagiarism that way. I assumed Sculpting was talking about Moog because that would make the most sense. As I previously stated, no admissions officer is going to understand an applicant’s research. They just aren’t qualified to. </p>
<p>Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk</p>
<p>1) I’m no researcher, but even I’ve published a paper (and submitted it to a highly selective publication). I was the 4th author but I had done probably 90% of the work and actually wrote the initial draft of what was submitted. “First author” is typically the PI and in many cases they may have actually done minimal work on the project.
Having your name on any paper as a high school student is remarkably impressive, regardless of what number your name shows up in. These kind of things are usually TEAM based. Not individual. And the admissions committee is well aware.</p>
<p>2) My god this is ridiculous:
You have NO IDEA what you’re talking about. Plenty of people who work in the admissions office and read essays (for both admittance and scholarships) are more than qualified to decode the general gist of a research paper. They may not understand the nitty gritty, but it doesn’t matter.
Hell, there are former WashU students in the admissions office, some of whom were engineering or hard science majors… who also did research at WashU & other schools. No need to insult them by saying that they aren’t going to understand or are under qualified.</p>
<p>Hi there!</p>
<p>I included my research abstract in the additional info section of my Common App, but my research wasn’t anything super groundbreaking so I don’t think it’ll have a major impact. I know you’ve probably already submitted your app and everything, but to reiterate, I think including an abstract is fine if you feel like it’s an important part of your application that doesn’t really fit anywhere else. </p>
<p>And I also think that many adcoms would be qualified enough to understand students’ abstracts! It would be cool if the person who reviewed your app was actually familiar with what you’ve researched–in that case it might even count as a boost.</p>