URM: Biology Research Fellowships for Undergraduates at Cornell University

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This award to Cornell University is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5). Cornell University will establish am Undergraduate Research and Mentoring (URM) program to engage under-represented minority students in intensive mentoring and research experience and prepare them for graduate studies in the biological sciences. The Cornell Biology Research Fellowships program will serve 35-50 Cornell undergraduates (7-10 per cohort) during the five-year period of the grant. NSF funds will support seven students in each cohort, or a total of 35 students. Through participation in research seminars and by shadowing faculty, freshmen and sophomores will have the opportunity to explore different fields of biology before applying to the program. The Biology Research Fellowships will offer a carefully designed set of activities that includes two years of funded research internships in faculty laboratories, a seminar series focusing on reading the scientific literature, writing research proposals, preparing and delivering scientific presentations, GRE preparation, and choosing and applying to graduate programs. Students are also involved in community outreach and peer-mentoring. Faculty mentors, all of whom have strong records of successfully training undergraduates in their laboratories, include at least twenty scientists whose research fields span the range of biology. The students will participate in all aspects of life in an academic laboratory: learning the approaches and techniques of their field, analyzing experimental results and developing new questions, and preparing the results for publications. All students will write an honors thesis, and faculty mentors will encourage and facilitate co-authorship on publications arising from research in which the students have been involved. The Biology Research Fellowships will produce young scientists who can serve as role models or mentors to groups traditionally underrepresented in the sciences. During the program, students will begin to experience and contribute in those roles by working with underrepresented minority students (pre-freshmen, freshmen, sophomores) as well as through outreach to high school students and teachers. More information is available by contacting the URM Program Director, Dr Steven Kresovich (sk20@cornell.edu), or Dr. Myra Shulman (mjs59@cornell.edu), or by visiting the Cornell Office of Undergraduate Biology website at: http://www.biology.cornell.edu/brf.