Researching a Bright Future: Celebrating Student Achievements in the New Year

Happy New Year and welcome back. As we welcome the new year, I remind myself of our true north star – student success. Student success drives everything we do – our instruction, our research, and our service. They come full circle only when they improve the lives of our students.  And thanks to you, our faculty and staff, our students are empowered to succeed.

Success was writ large at the IU Undergraduate Research Conference held on December 6th. This event invites participation from all IU campuses and showcases a variety of disciplines. Professor Tom Stucky, his planning committee, and all faculty mentors deserve our gratitude and kudos. Our students, with mentor supervision, presented their research work through posters and presentations. The topics ranged from cell autophagy and Type 1 Diabetes to developing programs for improving public health, the effects of urbanization and biodiversity, to the use of license plate readers by police officers. Congratulations to students Yashawini Battina, Bryce Guidry, and Nora LaRoche, who were recognized for their ‘Outstanding Performance,’ and all who participated and received honorable mention. 

Research matters – whether it was the introduction of the polio vaccine in the 1950s by Jonas Salk at the University of Pittsburgh or the work led by IUSM’s Dr. Larry Einhorn that improved the recovery rates for testicular cancer from 5% to 95% – research improves lives. Research creates a sustainable impact when it is transferred to the next generation of learners – our students. For this reason, it is hard to overemphasize the role of research in our undergraduate (and, of course, graduate) curriculum. 

Thank you, Professor Stucky and your team, for all that you do to develop our future researchers. Happy New Year to all.

Go Jags!

Latha Ramchand
Chancellor