Science Journal Club

[Flamingo123]

I am interested in starting a new club at my college. However, many clubs are meaningless and are there just to put on applications while they don't do anything. While I am also interested in putting it on my application, I want it to have some purpose.
I was thinking about starting a science journal club in which I would publish a summary of a select few articles and studies that are particularly fascinating to science majors. Maybe I would have different sections like biology, immunology, microbiology or genetics and have students from these classes contribute to a fascinating article. I find science fascinating and I would love to channel my enthusiasm for research and various science and medical topics and encourage others.
I was also thinking about having a section for non-science majors who may find this fascinating but cannot understand all the scientific/medical jargon.
These are just some of my brainstorm ideas. Should I skip out the 'nonscience major' section or make it for science majors or just do it for the general student to understand? Any other ideas or things I should or shouldn't do?

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[crazymedguy123]

Do whatever you want. If you enjoy it then why not. In terms of the non-science majors section, if you want to take that on as well then sure. Or maybe find a friend who has a passion for other topics that may be more knowledgeable in non-science fields.

 

[ClimbsRox]

I started an undergraduate biology journal club my last semester in college. Don't expect a lot of people to attend (our largest meeting was 5 people), but it can be fun. We structured ours by doing a different topic every week. The first half of the semester was microbiology focused. The second was cell biology focused. Most of the time was spent helping the few freshman that showed up work their way through a few panels of the paper. Putting together summaries sounds super time consuming, but hey, more power to you if you do it. I put it on my app and tt has come up on a couple interviews so far. I talked about how I saw a need for more support for undergraduates learning how to read papers and how it gave me a chance to read some stuff I wouldn't have read otherwise. Interviewers seemed happy with that answer.

 

[Flamingo123]

I started an undergraduate biology journal club my last semester in college. Don't expect a lot of people to attend (our largest meeting was 5 people), but it can be fun. We structured ours by doing a different topic every week. The first half of the semester was microbiology focused. The second was cell biology focused. Most of the time was spent helping the few freshman that showed up work their way through a few panels of the paper. Putting together summaries sounds super time consuming, but hey, more power to you if you do it. I put it on my app and tt has come up on a couple interviews so far. I talked about how I saw a need for more support for undergraduates learning how to read papers and how it gave me a chance to read some stuff I wouldn't have read otherwise. Interviewers seemed happy with that answer.

Thanks for your input! I like how you spent time helping freshman work through reading papers. May I ask, how did you go about doing that? My personal experience was that the more science classes I took and more science knowledge I obtained, the easier it was to read academic papers. How do you help freshmen with that? Also, it seems more of an additional class rather than a club. Did you structure it that way or make it more fun?

 

[ClimbsRox]

Thanks for your input! I like how you spent time helping freshman work through reading papers. May I ask, how did you go about doing that? My personal experience was that the more science classes I took and more science knowledge I obtained, the easier it was to read academic papers. How do you help freshmen with that? Also, it seems more of an additional class rather than a club. Did you structure it that way or make it more fun?

I went in with little expectations of how it would work. We picked topics for each week beforehand in hopes that it would get people interested. We deliberately ran it as a roundtable instead of having specific people present the paper like most journal clubs do, but that was the extent of our planning. It ended up being only freshman that showed up, so we focused on interpreting results from common experimental methods (PCR, Westerns, IF, etc.).

 

[capt34500]

At my university, we have a club that posts journal papers and small articles about science online. Kind of like a BuzzFeed publication, but for people interested in science. Maybe you can look to see if you can start a chapter at your school?

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[Flamingo123]

At my university, we have a club that posts journal papers and small articles about science online. Kind of like a BuzzFeed publication, but for people interested in science. Maybe you can look to see if you can start a chapter at your school?

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Thank you. I just took a look. It seems like something I would like to model.

 

[MyOdyssey]

At my university, we have a club that posts journal papers and small articles about science online. Kind of like a BuzzFeed publication, but for people interested in science. Maybe you can look to see if you can start a chapter at your school?

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Nice looking website. Did you buy an off the shelf web design kit or code this yourself with the help of friends?

 

[capt34500]

Nice looking website. Did you buy an off the shelf web design kit or code this yourself with the help of friends?

This is actually the main organization. I have no idea who designed the website. My university simply runs the chapter and we have our own separate website.