The Importance of Research Programs for High School Students

Bob Malkin: [00:00:00] Now some people are doing research because universities are starting to look for it more. It's a confusing time now. Things are changing again. For a while standardized test scores were not being looked at by some universities. They were being looked at by other universities. That's still the situation today.

Some yes, some no. And so they're looking at other criteria. What other things do they look at? Of course your grades, what high school you went to, things like that. But those aren't strongly differentiating. I tell people I had a class once where every student in my class was the number one student in their class at their high school, I think.

It's not strongly differentiating. Grades in high school aren't strongly differentiating anymore. So we're looking for other things. One of them might be research. It demonstrates critical thinking, teamwork, the ability, especially if you publish the ability to express yourself.

Jonathan Hughes: Hi everyone. And welcome to [00:01:00] another episode of the MEFA Podcast.

My name is Jonathan Hughes, and that was our guest on the show today. Dr. Robert Malkin. He's an emeritus professor in biomedical engineering at Duke University, and the co-founder of the International Research Institute. And that's an organization that matches up students with research opportunities. And as you heard in that clip, they can then use that research to cite in their college applications and make themselves look good to any prospective colleges that they might be applying to.

So all of you aspiring scientists, and perhaps the generally curious among you, Take note. We're going to be talking about all of that. We're going to be talking about the love of science, and we're going to get to know Dr. Malkin himself and what led him to this work, and you will enjoy that conversation, trust me.

He seems to have lived many lives in his one already, so stay tuned for that. Oh, and just one notice. If you're watching the show, I [00:02:00] have to apologize for a bit of video funkiness at a few junctures here where my image is frozen, and you'll still hear me. speaking just a bit of trouble there, but only slightly, only at one or two points.

And of course, if you're listening to the show, you won't encounter any issues at all. So I'll be back afterwards with the wrap up. But for now, let's welcome our guest to the MEFA Podcast and let him introduce himself to you.

Bob Malkin: So thanks for having me today. My name is Bob Malkin. I'm a professor of the Practice of Biomedical Engineering and Global Health Emeritus at Duke University.

Been at Duke for about 20 years or so. And I'm also the academic director of the International Research Institute of North Carolina, IRI, which is an organization that helps high school students and early college students find research opportunities in U. S. laboratories across the country.

Jonathan Hughes: Did you always wanted to be a scientist? Were you always into science as a kid? And is that, what was [00:03:00] that pathway to becoming a scientist like?

Bob Malkin: Yeah, for me, it was a little bit of an indirect pathway. So when I was a boy, my daughter, my, my brother was an engineer. And he was a student at MIT. He was a chemical engineering student. He brought home a textbook.

He had to take one electrical engineering course as a chemical engineer. He brought home his textbook and I was 13 at the time. And he gave his textbook to me, and I was hooked. I wanted then, from then on, to be an electrical engineer. And I'd studied electrical engineering at the University of Michigan.

Also computer engineering. And went on to do a job was to doing designing heart lung machines and pacemakers. Which is the thing I was really captured by. But I ought to say I lost Some interest in the field. I moved to Switzerland, did exactly the same job designing heart and lung machines, base makers.

But I lost some interest in the field and felt like maybe I was lost my direction. So I moved to Thailand and started teaching English as a foreign language. [00:04:00] And then our project was to try to stop human trafficking. Human trafficking was a huge problem then. And it actually continues to be a problem today, actually.

And what I discovered on that experience was a very small amount of knowledge can make a huge difference in people's lives. And so that kind of got me inspired to find the combination of the engineering and the direct help for people. And that eventually led me to research because I found that actually there was not that much knowledge.

There's not that much direct knowledge focused on how to help people, especially. Or people are impoverished people. And that has eventually led through several other organizations, I started a few other non-profits, to IRI where we focus on just the research piece of the puzzle.

Jonathan Hughes: That is an amazing story. You went from Michigan studying electrical engineering to Switzerland?

Bob Malkin: I did. [00:05:00] I moved to Switzerland for some years.

Jonathan Hughes: And then Thailand. And now, how were you in at Duke? Where did that come along?

Bob Malkin: So that was, so I loved being in Thailand. I loved my work there. I had a contract. I could have continued. I probably would still be living there today. But a professor at Duke called me while I was in Thailand and said, look, you come and study with me. I'll pay your tuition, I'll give you a salary, you'll get a PhD, and I was like I can't turn that down. Free tuition, a salary, so I was actually making money going to school and a degree.

This was a well known professor who was going to help me, learn the field and learn to be a scientist. So I just couldn't turn that down. So I moved back to Durham to study at Duke. So I was a student at Duke a long time ago. Eventually did go on to get a Ph. D., then was a professor in New York and Tennessee, and eventually moved back to Duke as a professor in 2004.

Jonathan Hughes: This is a compliment. I'm having a hard time keeping this all in my head because you've lived such a [00:06:00] full life.

Bob Malkin: It's been a complicated life and I've loved it. It's been a great experience every step of the way, including being a scientist.

Jonathan Hughes: You, you do have an invention to your credit, right?

Bob Malkin: Absolutely. We have several. We have early in my career, we patented a lot of the work. So I've got some patents on pacemaker related devices. Later in my life, I discovered that patents don't necessarily make things more available to the general public. In the developing world, in the resource poor setting.

So we went to a lot more open source and trade secrets protections for our devices. The PrEP pouch, a couple million units of that has been distributed. We also have a device for cervical cancer. PrEP pouches for HIV AIDS prevention of transmission of HIV. And several other technologies.

Jonathan Hughes: So there's definitely, a through line going through this conversation, which is, you mentioned earlier, marrying that love of engineering, electrical engineering, science, [00:07:00] and philanthropy in a way or, helping the developing world. And so that leads you, of course, to IRI. So tell me how you created IRI, which is the International Research Institute.

Bob Malkin: Absolutely. I've been working with high school students my entire life as a professor. So 25 years, 20 years at Duke, I've always had high school students in the lab. However, they've always been from the Durham area, from local high schools. When the pandemic hit. That became impossible. There was a period where it was very confusing how Duke was going to handle classes, whether we're going to do remote classes, in person classes, who was going to be on campus, and high school students were a lower priority than getting faculty and undergraduates, for example, back on campus, graduate students.

And so we, originally I got together with another Dukie and we created IRI just to facilitate continuing the relationships we already [00:08:00] had with high school students. But, we discovered almost immediately, there were thousands of students all over the US and all over the world that never had access to great labs.

Never mind COVID, never mind, all the problems we were having just finding a way to have people on campus without, being separated by six feet at all times and things like that. They never had access. People in rural parts of the US, which aren't near big research universities. Or even folks in cities where those are very competitive spots and they just can't find a spot or a spot that's intellectually matched with what they can do.

And then that's not to say anything about people in other countries, many of which don't have major research universities. We've continued IRI as a completely remote opportunity for research for high school students and now expanding to young college students. We offer programs that range from just a few weeks to several years and we accommodate [00:09:00] students who are, family incomes, the yearly family income of $3,000 to yearly family incomes of $300,000.

So we cover a very wide range of people and a very wide range of intellectual interests. Now, 21 universities are involved in the consortium, so it's spread far beyond Duke, all American universities, U. S. universities. And we're offering hundreds of opportunities per year for students.

Jonathan Hughes: And so what form does this research take?

Bob Malkin: So that's a great question. A lot of people think about research as, somebody in a white coat, goggles, staring at a microscope, mixing stinky chemicals, stuff like that. And that's absolutely a valid view of research. That is one kind of research. But there's plenty of research that doesn't fit into that category.

Think about a neuroscientist who's looking at MRI images. Very often, he or she is not the one who takes the MRI images. There's a tech who runs the MRI machine. They're looking at computer files. Or somebody who does work based on surveys. A lot of [00:10:00] psychological research is asking people questions.

It has nothing to do with chemicals and a bench. So there's a lot of kinds of research that don't depend on coming to a lab, wearing the white coat, staring in on the microscope. We are a completely remote operation, so we only do those types of research. Of course, it's limiting. It's not every kind of research that you can do.

The other thing to think about is there's we run at least two or three different programs, and it mirrors the kind of programs that a lot of universities are running. We run what we call introductory programs. Those just cover the first couple of steps of research, that's how to form a question, and how to write a literature review.

In other words, what has been done in the field. But we also run longer programs, which run one, two, three, four years. Some of them are dealing with existing data. That would be the example of perhaps a researcher looking at somebody else's MRI database. And there's a lot of these open source databases now.[00:11:00]

Or somebody doing original research, where they write up the literature review, find a question, just like everybody else. But they go on to write the methods, get research approval. Gather the data and now analyze the data, write it up and eventually publish it. So there's a lots of different types of research that we cover and it covers a wide range of time commitments.

Jonathan Hughes: But you mentioned that you always had high school students in the lab. And that's what, in a way, ties you to us here at MEFA and that is this has part of the college application process, right? They're having research. And why would a high school student want to do this research? And how do they, how did those students in your lab at Duke actually, how did they get there?

Bob Malkin: Yeah, it's a great question. So let's start with the first one. Why? Ideally, the reason that you're doing research is because you as a high school student are passionate about the topic. You just love whatever it is that you're looking into, and you want to learn more. So the most [00:12:00] overriding factor, I would say, of all folks in labs is curiosity.

They love the area that they're looking at, and they're passionate about finding out more, and sharing that knowledge with others. So we hope that's why everybody is doing research. Now, some people are doing research because universities are starting to look for it more. It's a confusing time now.

Things are changing again. For a while, standardized test scores were not being looked at by some universities. They were being looked at by other universities. That's still the situation today. Some yes, some no. And so they're looking at other criteria. What other things do they look at?

Of course, your grades, what high school you went to, things like that. But those aren't strongly differentiating. Thank you. I tell people I had a class once where every student in my class was the number one student in their class at their high school at Duke. It's not strongly differentiating.

Grades in high school aren't strongly differentiating anymore. So we're looking for other things. One of them might be research. It demonstrates critical thinking, teamwork, [00:13:00] the ability, especially if you publish, the ability to express yourself. On a scientific topic. As long as I've been doing admissions at universities we've always been looking at essays because writing is just so critical and expression is just so critical for success.

Even for me, remember, I'm an engineering professor, I demand that my students be able to write And express themselves well, and being able to publish demonstrates that so that answer is the why why people, why high school students in particular might be looking for this, how is much more complicated.

Let me just quickly outline. I've got 7 steps. I do have a book coming out with this, and I also have a YouTube. Video on this topic at theIRI YouTube channel, but very briefly Let me just talk quickly through what the steps are and aren't and let me start with what they aren't The way you don't find a job is by emailing professors in the area with a long list of your super credentials That just doesn't [00:14:00] impact faculty.

I sometimes during the season when a lot of high school students are looking for positions I can get 20, 30 emails per day from people looking for positions in my lab. And that extends to 35 year old postdocs down to 16 year old high school students. So they're just not possible for a 16 year old high school student to have.

Accomplishments that can compare to a 35 year old who is a postdoc, already published, already maybe knows my methods, so could come in the lab and day one start doing experiments. There's just no way. The reason that I take high school students is because, and this is true for all of my colleagues we are passionate about education.

We want people to know about research. You want young minds, young people to know about research, too. How do we generate knowledge? Where does knowledge come from? What is a fact? How do we know something? So what brings Thank you for joining us. Us to a resume of the 20 or 30 we get that day [00:15:00] is the passion.

Number one, before you start writing emails, before you start generating lists of people to talk to, before you start talking to people, figure out what you're passionate about. What are you interested in? That's going to get you the lab job much more convincingly than five more AP courses or something like that.

My recommendation to high school students is write a list of 20 things you wish you knew about your field. If you can't develop a list of 20 things, not Googleable facts, not something that's on Wikipedia. These are things you don't know you wish you knew and you can't find them. If you can't generate 20 questions, it may not be a passion.

That might just be an interest of yours. If you can generate 20 questions, then you probably have identified a passion and you're ready to start looking for faculty. Drive your emails with that passion. Start out by expressing that passion. Perhaps you did a science fair project around it. Maybe you have a biology teacher you've talked to about it.

Perhaps you read an article from the lab on the topic. Somehow, [00:16:00] Express your passion. That might lead to an interview. That's the next step. There's a few steps in between, but the next step you're going for is an interview. At the interview, that's when those questions really matter. Faculty value good questions more than good answers.

So during your conversation with the faculty, use your questions. Ask those questions. I really have been wondering why. Then ask the question. They may not know the answer, but they'll be impressed that you asked the question. And then finally, the last stage, skipping a few again, is negotiating something that will work with your schedule.

High school students tend to be very busy. And labs sometimes, they only do experiments from 9 to 3 in the afternoon, or Nine to noon, or maybe only on weekends, or maybe only at midnight. It depends what the lab is and what they're doing. Just got to make sure you can meet the expectations of the laboratory.

So it's a process. In summary, it's a process. Drive the process with your passion. But be patient. It can easily take six months to [00:17:00] find an in person lab job.

Jonathan Hughes: It really does mirror, in a lot of ways, the college admissions process, right? They want to see passionate students, and they want to see they get a sense of the students from their activities, from their essays they, and they want to see a student who is, In charge of their own, story, in a sense.

Bob Malkin: Absolutely and that's not an accident. I was associate director of undergraduate studies and engineering for a while. So I did work with the admissions office on the same faculty in the morning. I had meetings in the admissions office. I'm the same faculty in the afternoon when I'm meeting with students in the lab.

So the fact that, faculty are looking for a particular thing. In their classroom in their lab. It's not that surprising.

Jonathan Hughes: So tell me about iri then since it's inception you mentioned you're growing to over 21 Universities who are part of the program. How many students? Have passed through have you got to that point yet where you've Graduated or, students have gone through the program and you know how well you're doing and [00:18:00] have an idea of the success of the program.

Bob Malkin: Absolutely. So we've had a couple hundred students come through the program. And we're growing very quickly. So we have, I think, another 50 spots open this year for students. So we have quite a few students coming through now. A lot of those are doing the introductory programs. Those are the shorter programs.

Very popular over the summer. Typically in the range of 8 to 12 weeks, although we offer a 4 week summer experience as well. But we absolutely have students who have made it all the way through the 4 year program. In fact, I just submitted a manuscript this morning from one of my high school students.

So we've had publications across the field on oncology, prosthetics diabetes indigenous populations vaccine hesitancy just a wide variety of students interests. And these publications are very well received in, international archived, impact factor rated journals. So high school students absolutely can do this, and [00:19:00] we've been very successful with our students.

Jonathan Hughes: Are there any stories of appreciation coming from students coming to you and thanking you for giving them this opportunity to do this work?

Bob Malkin: That's the secret of, that's the hidden secret, of being an educator. You love students. Nobody really does this. This job doesn't pay well, and it's a pain in the rear end, but love students.

So absolutely. I have students from 30 years ago that I'm still in touch with. And there's certainly have IRI students with. In fact, I'm meeting with a student in a few days. That published with me as a high school student five years ago or something like that now she's a college student so absolutely staying in touch with the students.

The other thing is for the students I tell the students this is important for you as well It's not just that I feel good that I can have a coffee with you three years later four years later You may decide to go to graduate school And if you do you're going to need letters of recommendation all the [00:20:00] same kinds of things that you needed to get into undergraduate You need them and maybe even need them more You Going to graduate school.

And so you want to stay in touch with the educators, both the high school, but also faculty from your university that you really appreciated that you really felt changed your life. They can help you throughout your career for the entire rest of your life. Just a small side note, IRI was started in part with a student that I had when she was 17 years old.

She's much, much older than that now. And she was one of the co-founders with me of IRI. So we had stayed in touch all of those years. 20 plus years and through her career as a professional and then eventually her career as an entrepreneur.

Jonathan Hughes: What we've been talking about, in some ways, making it easier for kids who are interested in this field to enter college programs and ultimately to become a scientist. Why is that important and do you see any sort of risk [00:21:00] that people are not going to be interested in entering those fields anytime?

Bob Malkin: So that's a two part question. And I'll add a third part. It is absolutely true. We get a lot of children who are the children of scientists themselves, engineers, bioengineers, biotech doctors, whatever.

And of course, they have a predilection to enter the field. We all do. We all tend to follow in the footsteps of our parents, brothers, sisters, whatever, as I mentioned earlier about myself and my brother. But that leaves a lot of people behind. A lot of first generation college going kids, their parents, art scientists, their parents are doing whatever it takes to make it happen.

And so this leaves a lot of folks behind. So it's really important that we create programs. That allow everyone access to the lab everyone to discover. Hey, this is really cool. I can do this. I can Develop I can discover I can find out I can research There are tons of great programs [00:22:00] lots and lots of great programs on campuses and off campuses and whatever But it's really important.

I think to create these programs with also a gentle on ramp So students can just get a taste, maybe a summer perhaps program, if they really like it, go for maybe a trimester or a semester, then go on for two, three years. And I find problems on both sides. That is to say, parents who just pushing their kids into a three year program to do a research in a lab, and then you talk to the kids, and they just have no interest in what's going on.

They're just doing it because somebody told them, and it's really a shame. They could be great at something else, and they're probably being turned off, actually, from science. And at the other side, students who don't have access or don't feel they have access to a lab, want to get into the field and can't figure out how to do it.

So we have problems at both ends and it is just essential that we make pathways, especially for those students whose parents perhaps did not go to college. That's a group that [00:23:00] really has a challenge finding great lab positions.

Jonathan Hughes: Any final words of advice for those students or for any students who might be interested in entering a science related field, maybe they're in high school?

Bob Malkin: Yeah, my number one piece of advice is try to find an in person lab job. Even though IRI is a completely remote program, your preference should be an in person lab job. And the two main reasons are you might find a mentor, mentors in general in life. But certainly in science are really important to your success Somebody who's been down the path can give you advice from the inside So developing that mentorship it could be graduate students It could be a faculty member a junior faculty member postdoc or maybe some undergraduates Developing that network.

It's not a skill that a lot of high school students seem to spend time on Developing a professional network, but it's not too early it's a really valuable skill and it can really help you Get into college, but [00:24:00] also succeed in college and succeed in your career in the long run So that would be my advice for everyone.

Jonathan Hughes: Dr. Robert Malkin. Thank you so much for being here I really enjoyed this conversation

Bob Malkin: Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me.

Jonathan Hughes: All right. Thank you so much to Dr. Bob Malkin for being on the show. I really love that talk. And folks, if you liked what you heard today on the show and you want to learn more from us on planning, saving, and paying for college and career readiness then you can follow the show and you can find us wherever you get your podcasts.

And remember, please. It really does help us to keep doing what we're doing and getting the show out in front of folks like you. Oh, and please tell your family and friends who might be looking for information on the topics we cover about our [00:25:00] show. I want to thank Shaun Connolly, our producer. I want to thank AJ Yee, Lisa Rooney, and Lauren Danz for their assistance in getting the show posted so that you can hear it.

I'll be back next week, but until then, my name is Jonathan Hughes, and this has been the MEFA Podcast. Thanks.