The Project That Made Me a Researcher: Engineer or researcher—why not both?

Posted on by Stacey Huang

Over the course of the semester, PCURs will explain how they found their place in research. We present these to you as a series called The Project That Made Me a Researcher. As any undergraduate knows, the transition from ‘doing a research project’ to thinking of yourself as a researcher is an exciting and highly individualized phenomenon. Here, Stacey shares her story.

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Engineers don’t really do research, right? They just build systems.

A messy first draft of a circuit I was building the summer of my sophomore year.
A messy first draft of a circuit I was building the summer of my sophomore year.

Those were my thoughts when, in my high school years, I pondered my future career path as an engineer. I had always believed research was only about discovering new information on how the world works. To me, it was a pursuit limited to natural and social science PhDs (who, more often than not in my mind, were clad in white lab coats). Even coming to Princeton, I found it difficult to believe that as an aspiring engineer I would need to conduct much research. As I slowly became more involved in research, I realized it was something I was interested in pursuing further. However, my limited knowledge of technical fields combined with my relative lack of experience made me a little hesitant about my ability to follow that goal. It wasn’t until a project I worked on in Germany (during my sophomore summer) that I first felt like a true researcher.

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Accessing Princeton’s Resources: Just an Email Away

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Princeton has an incredible wealth of resources dedicated especially to undergrads. But where are these resources, really? And how do we gain access to them? In my experience, the key to getting resources and advice is to simply ask.

Towards the end of my freshman year, I knew I was going to do the month-long Princeton in Brazil language program in Rio de Janeiro. I wanted to spend the rest of the summer there, too, but wasn’t sure how to do it. I couldn’t afford three months abroad by myself — and, even if I had the money, how would I fill the time?

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where I spent the summer after my freshman year and had my first experience traveling outside of North America!

My Portuguese professor knew I was interested in queer studies, and recommended I talk to Professor James Green, a visiting professor from Brown with the Program in Latin American Studies. She told me he was an expert in the field. I felt awkward reaching out to a professor I didn’t know, but I sent an email introducing myself, explaining my interests, and hoping to set up a time to talk.

He agreed to meet with me a week later, and — much to my surprise — I walked out of his office with an offer to be his research assistant for the summer in Rio. It was an exciting opportunity — and exactly what I needed to apply for summer funding.

Continue reading Accessing Princeton’s Resources: Just an Email Away

What distribution classes will make me a better researcher?

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How do I square my research with my class schedule — and content?

The University of Sussex, where I spent my Junior Spring, is like many European universities in that its three-year undergraduate courses are focused nearly exclusively upon one subject. Whether they wanted to or not, the third-year chemists I studied with there could never have sampled from the broad menu of courses I have at Princeton. Seeing the alternative, I am more-than-ever grateful to be at a liberal arts university where even the most technical-minded engineers can – indeed must – explore topics far afield from their specialties. As with all exploration, I have found some electives more fruitful than others. But many non-technical classes have been incredibly useful in honing my ability to communicate my research, collaborate with researchers from around the world, and understand the political and philosophical implications of my work. Continue reading What distribution classes will make me a better researcher?

A Guide to Summer Research Opportunities

Posted on by Stacey Huang

Princeton Environmental Institute (PEI) graciously provided me funding one summer to conduct research in Germany.
Princeton Environmental Institute (PEI) graciously provided me funding one summer to conduct research in Germany.

Now that the year is in full swing and you’ve settled in with academic life, you might be starting to think about the next step (after you’ve tackled your midterms, of course). With fall break behind us, it’s a great time to start thinking about and applying for summer opportunities. It can be simultaneously exciting and overwhelming to think about starting your search, but happily enough (and perhaps equally overwhelming), Princeton itself offers a vast array of summer opportunities, which are a good place to start.

Below is a non-exhaustive guide to summer research and abroad experiences offered through Princeton that I’m aware of, designed to help make the process a little easier. Due to my background, the list is probably more relevant to science and engineering majors, but either way, I hope you’ll find some information that is valuable for your internship search. I’ve grouped them loosely according to domestic and abroad opportunities.

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Theological Moments

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It doesn’t quite mean wearing lab coats to church…

It’s late at night in the lab during my spring abroad in England. We’re waiting for the microplate reader to spit out another noisy mess of data, and I’m struggling. Not with any scientific point, but with trying to articulate poorly-remembered details of St. Thomas Aquinas’ teleology to a Muslim grad student colleague. What, you ask, does biochemistry have to do with Thomist teachings? Well, I wouldn’t be writing this if the answer weren’t “everything.”

Research, you see, isn’t just something we do in the lab or the archives. It’s a powerful expression of that fundamental human desire to understand the way the world works. It’s about wonder: We wonder where we came from, so we study cosmology and biochemistry. We wonder what came before us, so we study paleontology and archaeology. We wonder who we are so we study history, the arts, and the humanities. And we wonder at our place and our role in the world. And scientific answers lead to scientific questions, which inevitably stretch beyond the lab or the library into life. Continue reading Theological Moments

Welcome to the Woods

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In confusion, we find revelation.

Last summer, as I’ve mentioned, I researched the interactions between Bermuda’s groundwater and coral reefs. I entered the metaphorical woods: the ambiguity and self-doubt of immersion in data and details.

My mentor, Cleo Chou, taking measurements in the rainforest last summer.
My mentor, Cleo Chou, taking measurements in the rainforest last summer.

I came to the field with a set of expectations for my project: a conceptual forest, if you will. But in the field, I zoomed in, rebuilding this conceptual forest from the ground up. Surrounded by trees, details, and noise, I lost faith that I could find significant results – any conceptual forest at all.

On Day One of my project, I had an abrupt reality check. The groundwater discharge I was studying was nowhere to be found. I swam along the rocky coastline of Bermuda’s Tynes Continue reading Welcome to the Woods

To all the research skeptics

Posted on by Stacey Huang

Research can help you gain a lot of new insights.
Research can help you gain a lot of new insights.

When I entered Princeton as a freshman, I was skeptical that research could do anything for me. I considered myself an applied person who cared little for theory, and I hadn’t planned on continuing on to graduate school. The tides turned when I stumbled upon an optics Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) program when I was looking for summer programs freshman year. At the time I felt I had few marketable technical skills in my major, so I figured it would be a good chance to build up some useful skills and decided to give it a try. And I’m really glad I did — the experience made me realize how wrong I had been about my prior assumptions regarding research.

Are you a research skeptic, too? Let me tell you a bit about my story and why I would recommend giving research a try.

Continue reading To all the research skeptics

Pulling the Boat

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The water was so clear I could see the coral colonies on the reef below the boat. From dark clouds in the south, I heard a rumble of thunder. Dylan, our boat captain, eyed the horizon. “It’s okay for now,” he said.

Photo by Zoe Sims
My field site on a sunnier day, photographed from shore.

I had come to Bermuda for two weeks of fieldwork: collecting water samples showing the effects of groundwater discharge on the reef, and assessing its impact on coral colonies nearby. I had two weeks to bring together the essence of my summer research project. Sun or storm, out we went.

On this particular day, I was collecting water samples with Tori, a Princeton grad student, and assisting two divers as they sampled the coral colonies.

Donning my snorkel and fins, I swam over to check on the divers. I was underwater, watching them carefully extract a coral sample, when it started raining. From below, I watched the water’s vast expanse erupt in a textured tessellation, repeated as far as I could see. Those first moments of that day’s downpour are one of my summer’s most transcendent memories.

Photo by Anne Cohen
Getting to work at my field site in Tynes Bay, Bermuda.

Perhaps I also remember that moment so vividly because of the chaos that followed.

Continue reading Pulling the Boat

A Summer of System Change

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Selecting candidates for the fellowship isn't exactly easy - just ask panelist Shanti Raghavan (pictured)
The Ashoka India Selection Panel. Selecting candidates for the fellowship wasn’t exactly a serene process – just ask panelist Shanti Raghavan (standing).

“Sorry Kavi, I don’t think they’re a fit for our fellowship. Their proposals are not system-changing”.

I received this disappointing message countless times this summer while interning at Ashoka, a global non-profit organization committed to the spread of social entrepreneurship. Working out of the India office in the beautiful city of Bangalore, I was responsible for interviewing recently-nominated social entrepreneurs interested in Ashoka’s fellowship program. The program helps connect these select individuals with other fellows, resources, and tools to help further their work in the social space.

Every candidate I had championed was rejected on the basis of this lack of “system change” in their envisioned work. This confused me because each of these candidates was immensely successful in their field. Furthermore, their repeated denial was personally frustrating because when I talked to these candidates, I became personally tied to their work. One particular instance stands out to me. About a month into my internship, I had to reject a candidate who was educating adolescent village girls on gender equality issues through group-based discussions she secretly held in their college dorms. A day after I sent my report to my supervisors, I was unnerved to see the “not a fit” email in my inbox.

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Open Questions, Surprising Answers: Venturing into the Unknown

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We’ve all been taught the importance of putting our research in context. For me, when I took SPA 230 — Contemporary Spain in Context — this “context” took the form of a fully funded Spring Break trip to Madrid and Barcelona, during which each student was required to perform field research on a topic of choice.

When I first set foot in Spain, I had a two questions in mind: How has theater in Spain been able to survive the nation’s economic crisis? Why, in times of crisis, is theater important?

Studying the theater of the Spanish economic crisis, I saw multiple shows and interviewed actors, directors, founders of theater companies, and other theater professionals. While I started the research process with the above questions firmly constructed, I found that my most exciting, surprising discoveries came when my fieldwork forced me to shift my focus and expand to incorporate the unforeseen.

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Out to lunch with actors from Los Absurdos Teatro, an alternative theater company in Madrid.

Continue reading Open Questions, Surprising Answers: Venturing into the Unknown