To be successful it is important to understand what makes your advisor "tick."
Why do faculty work with undergraduate students? In 2001, Jared Pelligrini and Patricia Mabrouk conducted an unpublished study of chemistry faculty across the U.S. involved in undergraduate research. The researchers found that faculty participate in undergraduate research for a variety of reasons including:
- Faculty enjoy research;
- Faculty enjoy working with students;
- Faculty like solving important problems; and
- Faculty participation may be required for tenure, and/or promotion, and/or merit raises.
This study also found that a significant number of faculty are motivated because of their own highly positive undergraduate research experiences. So, the bottom line is that your faculty mentor may have very altruistic, idealistic reasons but they may also have very practical, pragmatic reasons for working with you in the laboratory.
Since most faculty support their research efforts in the laboratory through externally acquired research grants, it is important for you as a student to appreciate the pressures and time constraints under which your advisor may work. The duration of a typical federally funded research grant is three years. Each year, the principal investigator, the individual leading the research project, must file a progress report summarizing the work that has been accomplished, describe the plans for the next year, and list the publications that have been submitted and/or which have been published since the previous progress report. Most federal grant programs expect the investigator to submit a list of at least five peer-reviewed publications.
Industrial research grants are typically awarded on a year-by-year basis. The principal investigator may have to submit not only a written report of research productivity for the time period of the award but may also be required to make a formal presentation to the company. Because of concerns related to intellectual property rights, productivity is not normally measured in terms of peer-reviewed publications and meeting presentations.