In my opinion, don’t do the class professor. Most of the time there is high competition, but I am sure people here have experiences that disprove it. Coming from a really big state school where there is lots of competition like 1,600 applicants for a single job position, your best bet is to go through the department websites of your interest. Click on each name in the directory. My school also had a special building dedicated to a specific field of study, close to molecular biology and medicine. So this faculty was research only, did not teach, and so they were begging for people to help them out! So much so when I got my foot in the door, I hand-picked the people I nudged to get research opportunity. My roommate ended up working with my mentor’s wife. 2 other friends worked with me in the lab. I ended up getting a poster presentation, publication and some scholarships.
Some things to look for in chronological order:
1.) Do they publish regularly? If not, your chances of getting in on a paper are slim. More so, if they last publication was from 2005, chances are slim your experiences will be a good one. A good researcher will churn out a paper 1-3 years. My mentor was required to provide 2 papers a year.
2.) Read the paper title briefly. This will tell you plenty. If the papers published are ferromagnetic moments in a super-cooled plasma substance (entirely made up), likely this will not be a good route because most of the work will be highly complex, computerized, and out of reach of your understanding. Don’t forget both have to be a good fit. I wouldn’t email professors working on chemical reactions in metalorganics, if you haven’t had Organic chemistry yet. Some good projects to keep your eye out for, anything having to do with growing cell-lines, investigating work that seems within grasp given ample time to adjust.
3.) Good research experience will grab a hold of you ! When I looked for research a second time, I went through the entire directory of several colleges, and found one professor working on cardiovascular health and sulfur. This immediately grabbed my interest, and when I was ready to email him, I had a sudden urge to shine on paper and eagerness to talk to him. This type of magnetic pull will inevitably produce a better experience, just like choosing a major you are interested in, versus something mundane and dull you won’t like.
4.) In your letter make sure to reference the specific research. Yes, you should write however many personal emails you need. Do Not send out a mass email ! My first time around, several faculty emailed me back and said I sent similar to their friends. Mention why you like the research, come across as enthusiastic, and make sure to use early on the key words “long-term volunteer research position”. You will likely be doing grunt work, until you work into the paradigm of the mentor, and then start to develop ideas of your own to test out. This was at least my experience and similar echoed elsewhere.
5.) Make sure you are a good fit for the research, and don’t hesitate to leave if things are not progressing after a year of doing work. Nothing will magically appear, take the initiative, read extra papers, ask questions, show that you don’t need things repeated, and don’t be afraid to get friendly it will only help.
In the end I actually got a position because one researcher passed me onto his friend. And I ended up helping both of them out, producing my own work, and then I left after hitting a plateau and increasingly doing grunt work with no room to do individual work (2 years into position). I am in the process of getting into other work, but research is fun and really helped take the stress off, because during my study breaks I focused on that.
Please know, you will likely get 99% Nos. Some chuckles, even funny replies like “good hunting, I retired”. Either way, don’t give up just like you wouldn’t with anything else. I have seen some interviews conducted my school’s medical school where the person reiterated a couple times why the person did not do research in their field despite choosing a major in natural sciences. So be ready to talk about it all when the time comes.
My success has been with the location obscure, and medically-relevant research that doesn’t require million dollar equipment and is produced on frequent basis.
Good luck hunting !
