News, Events and Media

More than 150 students presented their research during the Intermountain Graduate Research Symposium (IGRS), the largest student-run research gathering in the Intermountain Range. Mary Cleave, former USU graduate and retired NASA astronaut was the keynote speaker for the conference.

The goal of the two-day symposium is to provide graduate student researchers the opportunity to present their research to peers in a friendly academic environment. Kimberlee Taylor, Graduate Student Senate vice president for research said about 500 visitors attended the event.

“The symposium provides students the opportunity to experience presenting with peers,” said Taylor. “Students also have the chance to network with professors and other students.”

Students are given 12 minutes to present their research during the oral presentation, with three minutes for question and answer sessions. The oral presentation consists of research thesis, projects that students are working, projects that they are planning to start, as well as other research ideas.

The poster session allowed students to visually showcase their research using charts, graphs and descriptions.

“Unlike previous years, this year the judge’s responsibility is to give feedback to students on what was done well during presentations, what can be improved on and provide some suggestions on the direction that the research could take,” said Taylor.

Kate Olsen, who is currently working on her masters in fisheries biology with the watershed sciences department, is one of the participants of the event.

“It’s a fun opportunity to work with scientists in a lot of other fields,” said Olsen. “I’m used to attending conferences where people are always talking about fish or only talking about watershed sciences.”

Eight awards will be given out based on abstracts submissions. Awards such as ipods and certificates will be given out during the luncheon on the second day of the symposium.

“It’s a nice opportunity for students to come and view each other’s works and support each other in getting through graduate school,” said Taylor.

- Nadiah Johari

Comments