Students at The Ohio State University at Marion will have another opportunity this fall to participate in meaningful research that not only engages them in producing new scientific knowledge, but also helps provide practical career and grad school research experience.
Ohio State Marion Assistant Professor of Evolution, Ecology, and Organismal Biology, Jonathan Calede was recently selected to receive one of the inaugural Meaningful Inquiry Grants from the University Libraries to transform his course EEOB 4510: Comparative Vertebrate Anatomy into an original research experience for undergraduate students.
According to Calede, he will be redesigning the class experience to implement the project this summer in time for the course to be offered on the Marion campus autumn semester 2020.
“I am excited to have the opportunity to implement this new step in my teaching and research,” said Calede.
“It is a great opportunity for students to familiarize themselves with the process of science,” he said, “engaging with producing new knowledge rather than just learning existing knowledge.”
“Students are going to be on the producing end of science, not just consuming it,” added Calede.
Students will turn in a final project around the last week of classes.
Calede said, “My goal is to hopefully lead the students to develop a manuscript for publication.”
Students will be given original data Calede and his students have been collecting since he began researching at Ohio State. Students will add to this dataset themselves and engage in comparative analyses of anatomical data on pocket gophers, kangaroo rats, and their relatives.
Overall, Calede believes students will help advance the knowledge in the field, while gaining practical experience in research. This is great set of skills to include in letters of recommendation to graduate schools because this unique set of skills can set them apart.