The Rocky Mountain Biological Lab (RMBL) hosts 10 students each summer to participate in the Research Experience for Undergraduate Site Program. The program is open to all undergraduate students, and stipends, room, board and travel are provided. Students conduct field research in ecology and evolutionary biology under the supervision of a senior scientist. The focus of the program is to help students, particularly students from underrepresented groups, consider and pursue a career in field biology. The primary emphasis of the program is an independent research project that students design and conduct under the guidance of a scientist at the RMBL. To assist both mentors and students, the RMBL conducts workshops in experimental design and statistical analysis. Upon completion of projects, all students in the REU program communicate their results orally at a summer-end symposium. Students are also required to submit a paper written in a scientific format to the program. Students are strongly encouraged to submit their papers to RMBL's online, peer-reviewed journal Undergraduate Research in Behavior, Ecology, and Evolution. Students interested in the RMBL's REU program should contact RMBL's Operation Manager (admin@rmbl.org, (970) 349-7231), or visit www.rmbl.org. PI is Dr Ian Billick, (director@rmbl.org).
hosted 50 undergraduates from 2008-2012 in its undergraduate research program. Funding for these students was provided by the National Science Foundation through its Research Experience for Undergraduates program. The goals of this program were to provide research training and to diversify the scientific workforce by hosting a significant number of students from minority groups which are underrepresented in the sciences. In terms of diversifying the scientific workforce of the 50 participants, 20 were Hispanic, 4 were African-American, and 3 were Native-American. All student participants conducted an independent research project under the supervision of a scientist. Students developed research proposals, mapped their research sites, collected data, archived their data along with metadata, analyzed their data, and presented their results in both written and oral form. Additionally, they participated in a range of enrichment activities, including responsible conduct of research sessions, journal clubs, seminar series, and discussion sessions. In terms of research outcomes, student participants were co-authors on 9 peer-reviewed scientific publications, gave 8 talks based upon their research, presented 2 posters, and received 4 awards. Long-term tracking dating back to the program's start indicates that a large number of student participants go on to a career in the sciences. We have tracking information for 182 participants since 1991. Over half of the participants went to graduate school, 35 of whom have received PhD's, and 27 of whom have received Master's degrees.
