Research Whiz Kids
Summer Signals Intense Undergraduate Study at Trinity  
By Susie P. Gonzalez

The first computer science REU cohort with professors Christine Drennon, far left, first row; Yu Zhang, third from left, first row; and Mark Lewis, third from left, back row.

More than 100 students have stood toe-to-toe with dedicated Trinity faculty members this summer to intensify their classroom or laboratory learning beyond the traditional academic year. They have listened to each other’s research and learned about trends in scholarly publishing while focusing on their own discipline. Along the way, they’ve had fun at an ice cream social and roller skated with a computer science professor.

Among the 112 undergraduate researchers is a subset of Trinity students and students from off campus who are taking part in the Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) in mathematics, chemistry, and computer science. All are living on campus for 10 weeks and are earning at least a $3,500 stipend, thanks to generous grants from the National Science Foundation. The University contributes substantially by providing student housing and a travel allowance and funding related expenses associated with holding such programs.

The REU programs help distinguish Trinity as a leader in nurturing talented undergraduates who want to take their studies to the next level, said Claudia W. Scholz, research programs coordinator in Academic Affairs and an organizer of research programs for the 2008 cohort. “Here, where teaching and research are more balanced, these types of programs can thrive.”

They flourish by drawing a high caliber of students from prestigious Ivy League and West Coast universities with reputations as top-tier research institutions. Those students, in turn, enrich Trinity academics with fresh ideas and enthusiasm and contribute to ongoing faculty research.

The newest REU in computer science is administered by Yu Zhang, assistant professor of computer science, who directs the laboratory for distributed intelligent agent systems. She is assisted this summer by Mark Lewis, associate professor of computer science, and Christine Drennon, associate professor of sociology and anthropology. (Professor Lewis is the skater.)

“Our work is pretty unique to Trinity in terms of our interdisciplinary lab,” Professor Zhang said, explaining that professors and students from the departments of economics, neuroscience and psychology, and biology ultimately will be brought into the fold. The group is analyzing foreclosures in the San Antonio housing market.

The $205,000 grant from the NSF will be spread over three summers and already is benefiting nine computer science students in the summer of 2008. Much of the preliminary research for the project was conducted by two students who graduated in May, Philip Coleman of Albuquerque, N.M., and Michael Pellon of Houston. Both published a minimum of 13 papers about their research and each plans to pursue a doctorate in computer science.

An REU program has been housed in the mathematics department in three-year grant increments almost continually since 1997, with NSF grants totaling almost $800,000. Managed by Professor Scott Chapman, students have published dozens of papers in peer-reviewed mathematics journals.

The program “has become an intricate part of the department and has played a key role in strengthening and improving the mathematical education we offer our own students,” Professor Chapman said. Former participant Nathan Kaplan won the 2008 Frank and Brennie Morgan Prize for Research in Mathematics for outstanding research by an undergraduate. Nathan studied numerical monoids with Professor Chapman in 2004 and returned to campus as a graduate assistant in 2007 after earning a degree with high honors from Princeton University. He is pursuing a doctorate in mathematics at Harvard University.

In the chemistry department, Professor Nancy Mills has directed what is called a dispersed REU since 2002, with a break in 2005. The two grants have totaled $410,000 to support two students at Trinity plus students at five other colleges, including Juniata in Pennsylvania, Trinity College in Connecticut, Macalester in Minnesota, Colby in Maine, and Northern Kentucky University. The first grant was started by a Juniata professor whose work is so specialized that he was unable to draw a large enough group at his institution. Thus, funds were shared with like-minded professors at other universities.  

“The primary benefit from having a student from another college working in the department is so that the students can learn about life at another institution and understand the strengths of their Trinity experience. A secondary benefit comes from having the students return from their trip to a national (chemistry) meeting and talking with the rest of the students about what they experienced. This can have the effect of expanding the ‘vision’ of the students who didn’t go to the meeting,” Professor Mills said.