Q: How can students benefit from undergraduate research projects?
A: “There are kind of two angles in which benefits happen. The most obvious is the academic side of things,” says Kristel Gallagher, assistant professor of psychology at Thiel College. “It really enhances what students are learning in the classroom and reinforces the concepts that we are teaching. They get involved in this research and realize there’s this whole new path that they did not know was there before, and they are really excited to take that. I always believed that research mirrors real life. When we guide students through this research process and the ups and downs, we are also helping them gain skills that they are going to call upon pretty heavily in their future. Students learn to work together with a faculty member in more of a mentorship relationship.”