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Well if that's the case, then the focus should be on finding the schools that do have research opportunities. We shouldn't be worrying about whether a school is the top in bio or business or anything else: LAC or Research I.</p>
<p>The fact is that there ARE Research I universities in which undergrads have the opportunity to make meaningful contributions to research. I know that the University of Nebraska has such a program in its Undergraduate Creative Activities & Research Experiences (UCARE). I'm fairly certain that other large Universities (Kansas and maybe Oklahoma) are also creating such programs if they haven't been done already.</p>
<p>And just as surely as there are Research I universities that do allow meaningful research by students, there are LAC's that don't. </p>
<p>So the lesson for the original poster is: If you want to move on to a PhD go where you can do reasearch.
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<p>Yep, and that's my precise point. There is no point in going to a school that has lots of research activities, if you as an individual undergrad are not allowed to participate in thse activities. Who cares about that. What really matters is the quality of the research activities that you as an individual are allowed to participate in. As a case in point, there are plenty of large public schools that have plenty of research projects. The problem is that they also have lots and lots of undergrads trying to get into those projects, such that you as an individual undergrad are probably not going to get much access to those projects. </p>
<p>LAC's may not have big-time research opportunities, but they also don't have lots of students (both grad and undergrad) trying to compete for those opportunities. Hence, as an individual undergrad, one might say that you may actually be BETTER off going to a LAC than to a major research university. After all, what does it matter if your school has lots of big-time research going on if you are not allowed to participate in any of it because there are too many other students trying participate? It's like being an injured player for a team that wins the championship. Yeah, your team won the championship, but you had nothing to do with it. You were just there as a hanger-on.</p>