Work in Progress: Effectiveness of an REU SITE at Preparing Students for Graduate School

This is a follow-up to our initial study of our Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) SITE program focused on preparing students to pursue graduate degrees in Biomechanics and Mechanobiology (BMMB). Our first study summarized that the program met our objectives of providing students an independent research experience, increasing their perception of preparedness for success in the graduate application process and graduate school, and increasing their ability to communicate about BMMB1. Here we report on where our students are now and how the program enhanced their knowledge, skills, and preparation for graduate school. We used our site-licensed online survey tool Qualtrics to administer the surveys used to collect the data. We used pre- and post-survey data to assess changes over the 10-week period. The data were analyzed using a paired t-test from GraphPad Prism 9.3.0 software. The data indicate that by the end of the program students believed they were better able to prepare and give research presentations, p<0.01 and p<0.05 respectively. Similarly, students expressed feeling better prepared to write an abstract by the end of the program, p<0.005. Furthermore, students felt better prepared to design posters, p<0.05. In fact, 90% of faculty indicated that their students did well presenting their symposium posters. By the end of the program students believed their knowledge of the applications of the work done in the field of BMMB had increased, p<0.001. Additionally, 2 students have co-authored publications from their research projects. So far, 80% of our participants have applied to graduate programs. Seventy percent are currently enrolled in a graduate program. All of the participants in our REU SITE program have been from an underrepresented minority group. The enrollment of our participants in graduate programs has begun to enhance diversity in engineering. Moving forward we will continue to track student progress through their degrees and the careers they ultimately pursue in comparison to their original intent as reported during our program.