<p>“i had a world renowned researcher grade my research paper once, it was life changing.”</p>
<p>There’s your answer: it’s not a waste.</p>
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LAC students have excellent grad school placement because few students go to an LAC without intending to go on to graduate school. According to the Encyclop</p>
<p>^^^i don’t understand how that’s any different from HYP, W&M or WUSTL?</p>
<p>At Texas a lauded economist, Kindleburger, arrived with fanfare. We undergrads had to buy 5 or 6 of his book each, he gave two lectures while propped up by TA before they wheeled him out. I don’t think that his eyes focused on anyone although he kept talking.</p>
<p>No thanks, not interested in trophy lecturers to only speak to god and grad students</p>
<p>toadstool,</p>
<p>Your comment is too generalizing to be meaningful.</p>
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Having been an undergrad at one of these institutions and a grad student at another, I think this is something of a red herring.</p>
<p>At top institutions, there aren’t many distinctions made between grad students and undergrads. At MIT, where I went for undergrad, most upper-level undergrad classes are joint grad/undergrad classes, and undergrads are free to take purely graduate courses as well. Undergrads, grad students, and postdocs work shoulder-to-shoulder doing groundbreaking research, and undergrads are seen as scientists in training with ideas and talents to contribute.</p>
<p>As a grad student, I reject the idea that I’m taking attention away from anybody by my presence. I don’t take classes any longer, and I work in my lab full-time. I see my advisor, certainly, but so does the undergrad who works with me on my project. (Actually, in terms of advisor time per hour spent in the lab, my undergrad sees him a lot more than I do.) We work together, and I’m not taking away research opportunities for undergrads by being here: I’m creating them.</p>
<p>I feel I was well-served by attending a top research institution as an undergraduate. Of course, I wanted (and continue to want) to be a researcher myself, so the research excellence was a strong plus for me.</p>
<p>Incidentally, I disagree somewhat with the popular characterization of excellent researchers as generally poor teachers. Academia revolves around not only making discoveries and doing outstanding research, but also communicating (and selling) that research to peers and to funding agencies. The really top superstar researchers are superstars because they have excellent ideas, but also because they have convinced everybody else of the validity of their ideas through papers and lectures.</p>
<p>Having done research with a “superstar” professor I can tell you its not very satisfying. All of the research is done by graduate students and post docs, whom you will primarily work for as an undergraduate doing whatever. I was a visiting REU student and at least got to fiddle around with lasers - an actual student of the school was soldering circuits (from the graduate students’ diagrams) his entire summer. Overall the happiest students were those working directly with their non-superstar professors, as they just got more attention, help and understandable material.</p>
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<p>True, but writing papers and giving lectures are fundamentally different then trying to impart basic knowledge to 50+ undergraduates in a general lecture class. I’m not saying there is zero correlation between superstar researchers and their pedagogical abilities, but that the correlation is less than you imply. Let’s face it, superstar researchers are hired for their research and their ability to generate grant money, not for undergraduate teaching. More often than not, the best lecturers are not superstar researchers, but merely good at research. For example, on MIT’s online lectures, the best lecturers are not superstar researchers (Walter Lewin comes to mind here). I think the value of a superstar researchers comes into play when you actually do research, work, or have seminars/personal discussions with them. Lecturing to 50+ people in an intro class does not yield the full potential that these superstar researchers hold.</p>
<p>Ok, so we seem to end up at some superstar faculty being a waste for undergrads, and some superstar faculty being poor teachers for undergrads. And then some are not a waste and are also good teachers.</p>
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<p>Kudos to those schools if that is true, but I wonder how you know this. It’s not really obvious at Tech, but I would say that the big shots almost exclusively teach the graduate classes here; pretty much all of my graduate professors are IEEE fellows, AAE members, etc. There are a few that do teach the intro classes, however.</p>
<p>Also, congrats to Harvard if they can get Nobel Prize winners to teach Chem I.</p>
<p>I did summer research under a really super famous top 100 genius Harvard professor/MIT Grad/Rhodes Scholar/Oxford grad/Harvard Medical School graduate. Uber smart lady who taught one graduate course a year at Harvard. She is pretty much a full time researcher.</p>
<p>It wasn’t really satisfying. She may go on to win the Nobel Prize, I seriously could care less. She had me labeling vials all day in her lab 
Most of the serious and fun work is done by graduate students :(</p>
<p>Phead, I think we’re all wondering about the most important question: was she hot?</p>
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Maybe that’s because graduate students can devote 4-5 years of 60-hour weeks to a research project, instead of a single summer.</p>
<p>At that point, you should be looking at the difference between researchers, not the difference between schools. There are absolutely professors at top universities who do bench work in their labs, and who personally mentor their undergrads and grad students. By and large, superstar professors are idea generators and funding generators for their laboratories – they’re too busy to be in the lab all the time. But that’s a choice you can make for yourself within a school, because not all professors at a school or in a department are one way or another.</p>
<p>Personally, I chose to be in superstar labs both as an undergraduate and a graduate student. I like the cutting-edge research being done, and I don’t want a professor hanging over my shoulder all the time. I’m happy to be a little more independent.</p>
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This is not how I would characterize research in my lab. In my lab, research is done in teams, and those teams are composed of a mix of undergrads, grad students, and postdocs. Undergrads absolutely contribute to the intellectual development of the research, and perform independent parts of the overall project. They work with our PI the same way the grad students and postdocs do – they meet with him in groups and one-on-one. They give lab meeting and get input from other researchers. They coauthor papers in the scientific literature.</p>
<p>I think this is a matter of perspective. If you choose to think of yourself as a peripheral member of a research team, just working for the grad students, you will be treated as a peripheral member. If you choose to be intellectually involved in the work and propose experiments, your input will be valued.</p>
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<p>Right. So that’s a good reason seek out schools that keep class sizes down. It’s not a reason to avoid “wasting” superstar faculty on undergraduates.</p>
<p>But suppose the goal is to leverage their influence beyond the small classroom. In that case, star faculty can play other roles in undergraduate life besides classroom instruction. They can play leading roles in curriculum and testing design, teacher training and mentoring, policy and planning.</p>
<p>HAHAHAHAHAHA - [Broad</a> scientist Pardis Sabeti receives prestigious research awards | Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard](<a href=“http://www.broad.mit.edu/news/193]Broad”>http://www.broad.mit.edu/news/193)</p>
<p>[Pardis</a> Sabeti - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pardis_Sabeti]Pardis”>Pardis Sabeti - Wikipedia)</p>
<p>In addition to graduating summer cum laude from Harvard med school and developing novel methods for DNA genetic mutation determination, she is also the lead singer of a band and has a great voice! She rides a bike and allowed me to nap in her sleeping bag under her desk during my lunch break. SHE IS AWESOME!</p>
<p>YES SHE IS HOT ! ! ! 
Did I mention that she was one of the World’s Top 100 living Geniuses? ■■■■ (I didn’t know this btw when I was researching under her…She is like the nicest person I’ve met in my life…)</p>
<p>Oh, there is a list of Top 100 Living Geniuses? How can we keep this a secret from Hawkette?</p>
<p>many professors at top LACs choose to go there because they want to teach. sure, you’ll get some who simply didnt get the job at Harvard or Brown and got the next best thing, but the vibe I get is that a majority of the profs at the top LACs want to be there so they can interact with the undergrads</p>
<p>My kid is a junior at Harvard and has been doing great research work for the past three years including summers with a very well known medical researcher at Boston Children’s Hospital. She has also formed close relationships with other well known professors. A lot of what is said about research universities is BS.</p>
<p>Large research universities (non-LACs), without prestige or superstar faculty, combine the WORST of both worlds, at least with regard to the two aspects the OP puts forth…</p>
<p>Phead, thanks for the update, but I’ve got a few bones to pick with you. First of all if she graduated “summer cum laude” it means she could only get into the summer program at Harvard. Riding a bike is something I mastered at age 6, so that doesn’t really count towards genius status. But MOST of all I object to the title of that article you provided a link to. I mean, granted, male scientists typically outperform female scientists, but that hardly makes it ok to refer to her as a “broad.”</p>