and gender; parent and family involvement in education; transition to adulthood; research methods; second-generation immigrant students

NSF REU program gives undergrads a taste of research

Rena Malai — Tue, 31 Aug 2021 18:56:37 +0000

NSF REU program gives undergrads a taste of research Rena Malai Tue, 08/31/2021 - 14:56

In This Story

NSF's Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) project gives students an introduction into research and the opportunities that come with it.

According to Albert Einstein, if we knew what we were doing, it would not be called research. This sentiment is not lost at the National Science Foundation (NSF), which funds the Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) project held at universities throughout the United States.

It’s a program designed to give students a taste of what graduate school may be like, as well as an introduction into research-based careers, according to Huzefa S. Rangwala, Department of Computer Science professor at Mason.

“The REU program brings students together in a setting where they can explore career pathways such as ethics and data science, get resume prep, and be introduced to the pace of grad school if that’s a path they consider taking,” says Rangwala.

At Mason, the REU program wrapped up in August. Thirteen selected students obtained first-hand practical experience of best research practices by participating in six projects spanning over 10 weeks.

Each participant took away a lesson learned, as the experience helped shape what kinds of opportunities a research background could offer.

To Jacinta Das, a Mason REU program participant from the College of William and Mary, her experience helped her to understand what research is and what it means.

“Investigating something in a methodical way, thinking about it in more than one way, this was helpful in figuring out how to begin researching something,” she says.

Gaining more experience in Python and Java, two widely used computer programming platforms, was a big REU takeaway for Mason student Jasmine Obas.

“I got to build off of the language in Java, which I’ve never done much in before. I’m more comfortable with it. But Python’s still better,” says Obas.

Besides the research component, Mason REU participant Melanie Gipson, a student at Georgia State University, says the experience helped her to build soft skills that are an important part of any research practice.

“It gave me more confidence to rely on people, confide in them, and learn from them,” she says.

Matthias Eyassu, another Mason student in the program, says a memorable lesson from his REU experience was learning how to balance breadth with depth when it comes to applying a research approach.

“It’s tempting to find all these exciting connections when researching a topic. Sometimes it’s better to exercise more discipline and stay focused—that’s something I’ve learned,” says Eyassu.

Even though REU has wrapped up, the remainder of the summer will not necessarily be spent in vacation mode for participants. Some will move towards career and research goals.

“I’ll be spending the next month or two starting my PhD applications,” says Mason student and REU participant Nate Krasner.

“I’ll be training for technical interviews and getting more training in coding,” says participant Hana Genana, a student at the University of Rochester.

Others discovered they are simply looking forward to graduation, sans grad school.

“I definitely don’t want to get my master’s,” says Obas. “I’m interested in continuing research, but I’m looking forward to graduation.”

All in all, REU was a good experience for the participants, and it’s something they highly recommend.

“Most of us feel it was an all-around good experience,” says Gipson. “I think it will lead to a lot of great things.”

Mentorship was emphasized during the REU program, and was an important component, says Rangwala, as it helped to ensure students had what they needed.

“We could not have had such a successful REU without our mentors,” says Rangwala, who mentored four Mason students. “It was an imperative interaction for students to understand the projects they were working on, discuss challenges, brainstorm, and receive support.”

Rangwala offers a special thanks to Mark Snyder who co-directed the program with him and all REU Mentors: Craig Yu, Kevin Moran, Thomas LaToza, Amarda Shehu, Antonios Anastasopoulos, Parth Pathak and Jana Kosecka.

Learn more about REU

Topics

Volgenau School of Engineering

and gender; parent and family involvement in education; transition to adulthood; research methods; second-generation immigrant students

computer science

Blake Silver

rstaffo2 — Thu, 11 Feb 2021 20:05:12 +0000

Blake Silver rstaffo2 Thu, 02/11/2021 - 15:05

Assistant Professor, Sociology

Director of Educational Pathways and Faculty Development, Honors College

Contact Information

Email: bsilver@gmu.edu

Phone: 703.993.1110

Mailstop: Honors College, MSN 1F4

Campus: Fairfax

Office: Buchanan Hall 205

Biography

Blake R. Silver is Director of Educational Pathways & Faculty Development in the Honors College and Associate Professor of Sociology in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology. He also serves as the Director of the Education & Health Research Hub in the Center for Social Science Research.

Dr. Silver received a PhD in sociology from the University of Virginia, where he was a Jefferson Fellow. His research focuses on culture, social stratification, and higher education, addressing questions about the role of colleges and universities in contesting and reproducing inequality.

His current projects examine college students' educational pathways, the senior-year transitions of second-generation immigrant students, and campus art and architecture. His research has been supported by the American Sociological Association, the Jefferson Scholars Foundation, ACPA-College Student Educators International, the National Resource Center for the First-Year Experience and Students in Transition, and the NASPA Foundation.

Dr. Silver's first book, The Cost of Inclusion: How Student Conformity Leads to Inequality on College Campuses (University of Chicago Press), explores how inequalities are reproduced as students pursue social inclusion on campus.

His forthcoming co-edited volume with Graziella Pagliarulo McCarron, Supporting College Students of Immigrant Origin: New Insights from Research, Policy, and Practice (Cambridge University Press), will be published in spring 2024.

Dr. Silver's second book, Degrees of Risk: Navigating Insecurity and Inequality in Public Higher Education (University of Chicago Press), is forthcoming in summer 2024. This book argues that students at public colleges and universities today confront rampant insecurity, amplified by common policies and practices employed by those institutions. Students encounter and manage this insecurity in very different ways, intensifying inequality at the intersections of socioeconomic status, race, gender, and other sociodemographic dimensions.

Selected Publications (Recent Articles and Book Chapters)

Silver, Blake R. 2024. “Understanding the Individual in Context: Socioeconomic Inequality in College Students’ Perspectives.” Social Currents, 11(1), 61-79.

Farago, Fanni, and Blake R. Silver. 2023. “Navigating the New University: How Students from Immigrant Families Experience Student-Faculty Interactions.” In Teniell Trolian and Eugene Parker, Eds. Fostering Sustained Student-Faculty Engagement in Undergraduate Education, p. 128-145. New York: Routledge.

Silver, Blake R. 2023. “Interpreting First-Generation Identities and Experiences: Exploring Student Meaning Making at a First-gen Forward Institution.” Journal of First-generation Student Success, 3(2), 106-123.

Silver, Blake R., and Lily Krietzberg. 2023. “Compartmentalizing Communities or Creating Continuity: How Students Navigate LGBQ+ Identity Within and Beyond College.” Sociological Focus, 56(1), 1-19.

Silver, Blake R., Freddy Lopez, Fanni Farago, and Tharuna Kalaivanan. 2022. “Focused, Exploratory, or Vigilant: Reproduction, Mobility, and the Self-Narratives of Second-Generation Immigrant Youth.” Qualitative Sociology, 45(1), 123-147.

Roksa, Josipa, Blake R. Silver, and Yapeng Wang. 2022. “Inequality in Higher Education: Sociological Understandings of Student Success.” In Nicholas Bowman, Ed. How College Students Succeed: Making Meaning Across Disciplinary Perspectives, p. 179-207. Stylus.

Kalaivanan, Tharuna, Lily Krietzberg, Blake R. Silver, and Bianca Kwan. 2022. “The Senior-Year Transition: Gendered Experiences of Second-Generation Immigrant College Students.” Journal of Women and Gender in Higher Education, 15(1), 21-40.

Roksa, Josipa, and Blake R. Silver. 2021. “Higher Education.” In Kimberley Kinsley and Robert Rycroft, Eds. Inequality in America: Causes and Consequences, p. 95-106. Greenwood, ABC-CLIO.

Silver, Blake R., Lily Krietzberg, and Tharuna Kalaivanan. 2021. “Transitioning OUT: Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Queer Students’ Concerns in the Senior Year.” Journal of the First-Year Experience & Students in Transition, 33(2), 9-27.

Silver, Blake R., Freddy Lopez, Tharuna Kalaivanan, and Lily Krietzberg. 2021. “Second-Generation Immigrant Students and the Senior-Year Transition.” Journal of Student Affairs Research and Practice, 58(4), 388-400.

Silver, Blake R. 2020. “Inequality in the Extracurriculum: How Class, Race, and Gender Shape College Involvement.” Sociological Forum, 35(4), 1290-1314.

Silver, Blake R. 2020. “How First-Year College Women Construct Identity through Co-Curricular Involvement.” Journal of Women and Gender in Higher Education, 13(3), 233-250.

Henderson, Lora, Blake R. Silver, Leslie Booren, Sara Rimm-Kaufman, and James Wyckoff. 2020. “Fostering Faculty Diversity by Supporting Access to Graduate Study in Education.” Journal of College Student Development, 61(5) 663-666.

Silver, Blake R., Tharuna Kalaivanan, Lily Krietzberg, and Jordan Hawkins. 2020. “Distance, Alignment, and Boundaries: How Second-Generation Immigrant Seniors Negotiate Parental Involvement.” Journal of College Student Development, 61(5) 558-573.

Roksa, Josipa, Blake R. Silver, Denise Deutschlander, and Sarah Whitley. 2020. “Navigating the First Year of College: Siblings, Parents, and First-Generation Students’ Experiences.” Sociological Forum, 35(3) 565-586.

Silver, Blake R. 2020. “On the Margins of College Life: The Experiences of Racial and Ethnic Minority Men in the Extracurriculum.” Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, 49(2): 147-175.

Silver, Blake R. 2020. “Social Class and Habitus at the End of College: Cultural Similarity and Difference among Graduating Seniors.” Sociological Focus, 53(2): 190-206.

Roksa, Josipa, and Blake R. Silver. 2019. “‘Do-It-Yourself’ University: Institutional and Family Support in the Transition Out of College.” Review of Higher Education, 42(3): 1051-1071.

Arum, Richard, Josipa Roksa, Jacqueline Cruz, and Blake R. Silver. 2018. "Student Experiences in College." In Barbara Schneider (Ed.), Handbook of the Sociology of Education in the 21st Century, pp. 385-403. Springer.

Silver, Blake R. and Josipa Roksa. 2017. "Navigating Uncertainty and Responsibility: Understanding Inequality in the Senior-Year Transition." Journal of Student Affairs Research and Practice, 54(3): 248-260.

Grants and Fellowships

ACPA Foundation Research Grant. “Layered Transitions: First-Generation College Seniors from Immigrant Families.” PI: Blake Silver; Key Personnel: Tharuna Kalaivanan, Fanni Farago, and Kellie Wilkerson (09/2022-08/2023). 

American Sociological Association. Fund for the Advancement of the Discipline Grant. “Labor Market Precarity and Higher Education.” PI: Blake Silver (11/2020-03/2022).

National Resource Center for the First-Year Experience and Students in Transition, Paul P. Fidler Research Grant. "Transitioning OUT: Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual Students’ Experiences in the Senior Year." PI: Blake Silver (10/2019-10/2021).

NASPA Region III, Research Grant. "Gender, First-Generation American Students, and the Senior-Year Transition." PI: Blake Silver (08/2018-12/2019).

The NASPA Foundation, Channing Briggs Small Research Grant. “Navigating the Senior Year Transition: A Qualitative Study of the Experiences of First-Generation American Students.” PI: Blake Silver (10/2015-10/2016).

Courses Taught

The Individual and Society
Culture and Social Inequality
Higher Education and Society
Research Methods
Social Inequality and the Self
The Transition to Adulthood
Ethnography, Place, and Community
Education in Contemporary Society

Education

PhD, Sociology, University of Virginia
MA, Sociology, University of Virginia
MA, Higher Education, George Washington University
BA, English, ��AV