Written By Jonathan Saxon
Bowie State University held the Course-based Undergraduate Research Experiences (CURE) Symposium on Dec. 12 in the Center for Natural Sciences, Mathematics and Nursing with project posters and students lining the atrium to present their research findings as part of the Natural Sciences Day.
Projects ranged from studying microbes in soil around beech trees to discovering the cause behind uneven gender ratios in the population of eastern painted turtles.
The symposium served as the culmination of the CURE program, a semester-long effort with over 200 students that seeks to expose students with no research background to practical, hands-on research opportunities that address topics in a variety of disciplines. Students, under the tutelage of Bowie State faculty, worked together in groups of 4-6 to get their hands dirty and learn how to conduct the work necessary to answer questions about the world around them. Dozens of student-researchers presented their work via project posters to fellow students, faculty and representatives from visiting agencies, such as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Future of STEM Scholars Initiative (FOSSI), and the Mayo Clinic.
“Talking to students and seeing how they want to be a part of the solutions for tomorrow, that’s what I find exciting,” said Dr. Kandis Boyd, a senior advisor at the EPA. “Bowie State is dedicated to their students in unprecedented ways. This relationship has great potential to be a win-win situation.”
Daniel Thompson, chief enrollment management officer for the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Science, were impressed by interactions they had with students at the symposium, which provided further encouragement for their team as they work to create a pipeline between Bowie State and the world-renowned hospital and medical school.
“Our executive dean charged us to establish partnerships with historically Black colleges or minority serving institutions that have a profile that demonstrates these are students that would be able to flourish in a medical school or research program like ours,” said Thompson. “We’re looking for colleges that have demonstrated great outcomes in preparing people for graduate and professional school. We could have gone anywhere, but the four schools we’re working to get into a partnership with are Oakwood University, Xavier University, UMBC and Bowie State.”