Courtney McKee ’11 talks about her research during last month’s Northeast Beckman Scholars Winterfest held at BC. (Photo by J.L. Levine)
Beckman Scholars Gather
Northeast Beckman Scholars Winterfest drew some of the most promising undergraduate science students in New England to campus
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Some of the most promising undergraduate science students in New England came to campus last month to present recent research and network at the Northeast Beckman Scholars Winterfest.Organized by Professor of Chemistry David McFadden, the Jan. 23 symposium featured the research of four current Boston College undergraduates who have won the prestigious research fellowships, as well as 12 Beckman scholars from Wellesley College, Boston University, Smith College and Yale University.
BC and the other universities are among a select group from across the US who have been awarded Beckman Scholars programs, which recognize outstanding undergraduate science students, place them with faculty research teams and fund their work.
In the past nine years, BC has selected 15 Beckman Scholars. The approximately $18,000 awards from the Arnold and Mabel Beckman Foundation enable students to spend 15 months – two summers and an academic year – conducting high-level research and attending conferences.
“This is a national award from a major foundation that wants to support the top students in selected colleges and universities who want to pursue careers in science,” said McFadden, a program coordinator. “These students are the cream of the crop in undergraduate chemistry, biology and biochemistry.”
BC’s Beckman Scholars include this year’s recipients, biology major Courtney McKee ’11 and chemistry major Stephen P. Bohlman ’11, and 2008-09 recipients Julian Vastl ’11 and Elizabeth Guenther ’11, both chemistry majors.
The award allowed Guenther to conduct research during the past two summers and gave her the resources to present her findings at the American Chemical Society annual meeting in Salt Lake City, as well as attend a Beckman conference in California.
“It helped inspire me,” said Guenther, whose research focused on a new approach to analyze enzymes with the potential to aid in treating tumors. “I got to apply what I learned in the classroom in the lab. Learning in the lab forces you to learn in a much more intense setting. I had in the back of my mind going to graduate school, but the Beckman Scholar program really shaped my desire to go to grad school.”
The idea of bringing the region’s Beckman Scholars together arose from the increasingly collaborative nature of research and the shortage of opportunities undergraduate science students have to meet their peers and faculty from other institutions. For these prospective scientists, networking will play an important role in their future work, McFadden said.
“We want students to meet students who share their research interests and also introduce them to the scientific community,” McFadden said.
“So the event was about research, but also allowed these students to get to build their networks as they are getting started in their careers. Networking is critical to scientific research as it becomes more and more collaborative.”