TY - JOUR
T1 - A Model for an Undergraduate Research Experience Program in Quantitative Sciences
AU - Tan, Kay See
AU - Elkin, Elena B.
AU - Satagopan, Jaya M.
N1 - Funding Information: The QSURE program is supported by the National Cancer Institute of the National Health Institutes (R25 CA214255) and by the Memorial Sloan Kettering Center Grant (CA008748). The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health. We thank Mr. Richard Koppenaal and Ms. Shireen Lewis for their administrative support for the QSURE program, and Ms. Yessenia Werner for her assistance in compiling the database of all internship listings posted on the American Statistical Association website. We would like to thank Dr. William Trochim for helping develop the pre-post evaluation. Publisher Copyright: © 2022 The Author(s). Published with license by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.
PY - 2022
Y1 - 2022
N2 - We developed a summer research experience program within a freestanding comprehensive cancer center to cultivate undergraduate students with an interest in and an aptitude for quantitative sciences focused on oncology. This unconventional location for an undergraduate program is an ideal setting for interdisciplinary training in the intersection of oncology, statistics, and epidemiology. This article describes the development and implementation of a hands-on research experience program in this unique environment. Core components of the program include faculty-mentored projects, instructional programs to improve research skills and domain knowledge, and professional development activities. We discuss key considerations such as fostering effective partnership between research and administrative units, recruiting students, and identifying faculty mentors with quantitative projects. We describe evaluation approaches and discuss post-program outcomes and lessons learned. In its initial two years, the program successfully improved the students’ perception of competence gained in research skills and statistical knowledge across several knowledge domains. The majority of students also went on to pursue graduate degrees in a quantitative field or work in oncology-centric academic research roles. Our research-based training model can be adapted by a variety of organizations motivated to develop a summer research experience program in quantitative sciences for undergraduate students. Supplemental files for this article are available online.
AB - We developed a summer research experience program within a freestanding comprehensive cancer center to cultivate undergraduate students with an interest in and an aptitude for quantitative sciences focused on oncology. This unconventional location for an undergraduate program is an ideal setting for interdisciplinary training in the intersection of oncology, statistics, and epidemiology. This article describes the development and implementation of a hands-on research experience program in this unique environment. Core components of the program include faculty-mentored projects, instructional programs to improve research skills and domain knowledge, and professional development activities. We discuss key considerations such as fostering effective partnership between research and administrative units, recruiting students, and identifying faculty mentors with quantitative projects. We describe evaluation approaches and discuss post-program outcomes and lessons learned. In its initial two years, the program successfully improved the students’ perception of competence gained in research skills and statistical knowledge across several knowledge domains. The majority of students also went on to pursue graduate degrees in a quantitative field or work in oncology-centric academic research roles. Our research-based training model can be adapted by a variety of organizations motivated to develop a summer research experience program in quantitative sciences for undergraduate students. Supplemental files for this article are available online.
KW - Analysis of biomedical data
KW - Applied statistics internship
KW - Computational biology
KW - Experiential learning
KW - Mentoring
KW - Statistical training
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85125426890&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85125426890&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - https://doi.org/10.1080/26939169.2021.2016036
DO - https://doi.org/10.1080/26939169.2021.2016036
M3 - Article
SN - 1069-1898
VL - 30
SP - 65
EP - 74
JO - Journal of Statistics Education
JF - Journal of Statistics Education
IS - 1
ER -