More than 30 students from the University of Washington Bothell presented at the 26th Annual Undergraduate Research Symposium held at UW\u2019s Mary Gates Hall in Seattle on Friday, May 19.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This year\u2019s symposium hosted presentations by undergraduates from across the three UW campuses. The UW Bothell students presented 20 different research projects and topics, ranging from \u201cNostalgic Analysis of Tweets During Crisis Events\u201d to \u201cMotivation in Non-Profit Organization Workers.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The symposium featured research across a wide array of academic disciplines \u2014 from business to STEM \u2014 with the projects covering data and information from as far away as black holes in other galaxies to as close as the UW Bothell\u2019s campus wetland.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In opening remarks for the symposium, Ed Taylor, UW\u2019s vice provost and dean of undergraduate affairs, also recognized the faculty support that makes this depth and breadth of student research possible. He then announced and congratulated seven recipients of the\u00a0annual Outstanding Undergraduate Research Mentor Awards<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 including Dr. Paola Rodr\u00edguez Hidalgo,\u202fan assistant professor in UW Bothell\u2019s\u00a0School of STEM<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Students presenting in the symposium each year can nominate mentors who have had a profound impact on their education and research. A small committee of faculty and staff then reviews the nominations to select the award recipients.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt was one of the most beautiful awards,\u201d Rodr\u00edguez Hidalgo said. \u201cIt\u2019s nice being recognized by the University, but it\u2019s also thanks to my students \u2014 and that\u2019s just so beautiful.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n She was nominated by two students from her quasar research group, Easton Robert Pierce and Alex Vong.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cPaola has been an amazing mentor. She has consistently pushed me to go beyond and motivated me to continue even when I\u2019ve hit a wall,\u201d said Pierce in his nomination for Rodr\u00edguez Hidalgo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cBetween her meetings, giving talks and writing papers, I\u2019m not sure where she finds the time for it all,\u201d he said. \u201cShe truly deserves to be recognized for all the hard work she puts into not only teaching classes but also mentoring students and leading the quasar research group.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pierce is a senior majoring in physics at UW Bothell. He first developed a love of astronomy when his parents bought him a starter telescope when he was nine years old. He is now a NASA Space Grant scholar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWhat drew me to astronomy is the pure absurdity of the scale and energies of the objects in which we study,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At this year\u2019s symposium, Pierce presented\u202f\u201cVariability in Extremely High Velocity Outflows.<\/a>\u201d Quasars are a phenomenon where gas and dust from extremely luminous galactic cores fall into a supermassive black hole. This can sometimes produce winds known as outflows. Whether these outflows affect the evolution of their host galaxies remains unknown and continues to be a point of interest in ongoing research.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cBecause of the large energies found in extremely high velocity outflows, we believe they may play a large role in the evolution of galaxies, specifically on their ability to form stars,\u201d Pierce said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In her presentation, \u201cValidating Fossil Charcoal Morphometry as a Tool for Determining Fuel Types of Ancient Fires,<\/a>\u201d Haley Brooks (Conservation & Restoration Science \u201923)\u202fsampled 34 modern plant species from UW Herbarium collections to study charcoal morphometry \u2014\u202fthe measurement of sedimentary charcoal particle shape attributes \u2014\u202fafter burning the samples at 500 degrees Celsius.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Brooks investigated if charcoal aspect ratio is a valid method for determining fuel type. If this method can be used when looking at modern-day plants, she noted, it may provide important insights into ancient fire regimes. Her mentors for this research were both in the UW\u2019s Department of Biology on the Seattle campus: Dr. Caroline Str\u00f6mberg, professor; and Dr. Christopher Schiller, postdoctoral scholar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n With the rapidly changing climate, Brooks said it\u2019s become a priority to gain a better understanding of how the changes will affect plant life to strategize conservation practices for the near future. \u201cWe\u2019re in a climate crisis right now where we\u2019ve never been in this climate zone, but the world has previously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSo if we\u2019re able to look at the climate zones of ancient fires and look at what burned at that time,\u201d she said, \u201cwe can put that into our conservation practices and have retroactive success in protecting those plant species that are used for fuel \u2014 before it happens.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Brooks noted in her presentation that continued research into the verification of charcoal morphometry as a means to verify fuel type could also help increase confidence in paleo reconstructions of ancient fuel types.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In his project, \u201cConcept Models show the Impact of the COVID-19 Disruption on Students\u2019 Cognitive Structures in a Statistics Course,<\/a>\u201d Eric Yoon Jae Shin analyzed student learning in a statistics course in both a pre-pandemic and pandemic setting. Dr. Caleb Trujillo, assistant professor in the School of Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences<\/a>, oversaw this research as Shin\u2019s mentor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe main thing we wanted to find out was whether or not the COVID-19 disruptions affected students learning,\u201d Shin said, a senior majoring Mathematical Thinking & Visualization.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Searching for answers, he looked to concept models \u2014 hand drawn models students use to write statistics concepts \u2014 to measure student learning. He analyzed 180 models from two different experiences and quarters: an in-person learning environment in a pre-pandemic quarter and an online learning environment during the pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe key finding that we made was that students in the online quarter were adding concepts to their models at a lower rate than students in the previous quarter, which was before the coronavirus pandemic,\u201d Shin said. \u201cWe came to the conclusion that the COVID-19 disruption had a major impact on a student\u2019s learning in the statistics course.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n What makes this kind of research so important, Shin noted, is that it can be used by professors to better understand and assist college students as they learn in different spaces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The presentations in this year\u2019s symposium represent the broad range of research, scholarship and creative practice projects that students can undertake during their undergraduate studies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Here is a small sampling of additional oral, poster and visual arts presentations UW Bothell students gave at this year\u2019s symposium:<\/p>\n\n\n\nSupporting their students<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Understanding stars in the universe<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Looking at ancient fires and fuels<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Examining learning during the pandemic<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Discovering the possibilities<\/h2>\n\n\n\n