Tips for Navigating the TRAIN Program

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 Hello everyone, happy Halloween! 

For our STEM Success class, we had to make a video talking about our experience as members of the TRAIN program. I partnered up with Cathy and together we came up with a video with tips to help guide students through the program! We tried to think of things we have learned and things we wish someone had told us. Hopefully they are helpful! 

Picking a Project:

- Make a list of professors you like and ask if they have projects going on

- Reach out to professor or lab 

- Reach out to other TRAIN scholars. Maybe you will find a project/professor you like 

- Reach out to ppl in different campuses 

- Look through lab websites or professor websites and see if you can find a research lab

Working on the Project:

- The majority of your research will probably be reading scientific articles, so gather background information. The best way to do this is to read the abstract of a paper, and the results/discussion to see if this is the best resource for you. 

- Lab notebook: make sure to keep it organized from the start! If your peers want to work on something similar, they can refer to your notes. Your notebook is a reference to your experiment. Keep this organized and detailed as possible

- One part of being in TRAIN is you have a blog for your work. This is useful because it lets you look back on the past and reflect on your work and also its a good tool to use as a portfolio if you want to show a lab professor your work

- Take notes of everything! Helps you with your lab work but also gives you ideas for blog posts

Presenting the Project:

- Get a map of the area/campus where the conference is at! And make sure you know where parking is!

- Figure out how registration works/ how you get in 

- Bring comfortable shoes and reusable water bottle. You’ll find that you'll be standing the most of time and talking to judges and presenters for hours

- Bring extra clips/things to hold up your poster in case of an accident 

- When asked questions, if you don't know the answer say that you don't 

- Bring notecards! 

- If you cant print poster on time, FedEx is great if you need to print your own! Just be prepared to pay for it


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