On a recent visit to the University of Southern California, Katherine learned more about how USC is providing research opportunities for students.
Watch the video or read the summary below to learn more!
Today I had the opportunity to visit the campus of the University of Southern California. Now I always enjoy doing on campus visits even if I feel that I am fairly familiar with the school because I always learn something new. One of the things that I appreciated learning about USC today was their emphasis on research. Both on the campus tour and in the admissions presentation, there was a lot of talk about the opportunities for students to do research.
Everything from looking at temperatures in Antartica to studying nano particles and how they affect solar panels. It is clear that students at USC are given hands-on opportunities in order to apply what they are learning in their major. Basically research was described as anything that would ehance the students skills in the current major that the student is in. So if they are theatre major, they can produce their own production or a music major may write their own song or again some of the more traditional types of research projects that I previously mentioned. There are also opportunities for students to obtain money to conduct these research projects and there are grants available to students.
I did ask how competitive it is to obtain a grant and it was stated that they are competitive, but again USC does provide a way to facilitate any student who is interested in doing research. They do provide a “Craiglist” like program on-line where students can post what they are interested in researching and faculty can go in a review it and contact students if they are interested. Likewise faculty can post information on research they are doing and opportunities for students to become involved. I thought that was a pretty cool way to make students aware of the research opportunities available on campus.
