Involving students in research
Involving students in research
![Bendik Deraas presenting a project](/documents/1271705576/1294243453/Bendik_presenterer.jpg/2446105d-8b4f-8075-75e5-b08f3c9ce42e?t=1593776177979&imagePreview=1)
“In Excited, they do research with students, not on students”, says Miriam Lillebo, student at the Department of Computer Science and member of the Excited board.
Using research to learn about research
In one of the study programs at Nord University students have to learn what is called Game analysis. The only problem is, there is no one book or how-to guide for Game analysis. Students were therefore tasked with conducting a literature review on Game analysis. “That way, students learned about two scientific analysis at once” Kolås explains.
Mini projects
Through Excited, students and staff can apply for funding for mini projects. A student got funding was Astradur Isak Larusson.
First year students at one of Nord University’s study programs have a project-based course with a lot of teamwork. Anchry started a project where he developed a training course for the team leaders, teaching them how to lead their teams. “The training was mainly in the form of weekly meetups with the team leads as well as being available when needed” Ace says.
According to Line Kolås, leader of Excited core project Learning through construction “projects like these would be much harder to accomplish without SFU Excited. A Centre makes it possible for students to come up with ideas for projects. We can start asking the students what they think will make their study programs better”.
![photo of students and faculty in a meeting at NORD](/documents/1271705576/1294243453/Nord-studenter-013.jpg/c71ac202-d79a-52f5-7b58-8fa512a57952?t=1593780356160&imagePreview=1)
Learning assistants and research assistants
A core principal in Excited is to involve students in research. The way Excited does this is through Learning assistants. “Excited has about 20 Learning assistants, ranging from second to fifth year students”, Ida Sortland says. She is the administrative coordinator for Excited, and responsible for the day-to-day contact with the assistants. “They become a link between Excited and the rest of the students”.
“The big difference from Excited Learning assistants is our assistants do much more than help other students with their studies and assignments. Our Learning assistants spend 50% of their time helping Excited researchers with everything from practicalities at conferences to actual research. They are also research assistants. This increases Excited’s research capacity”.
When Excited-researchers need assistance with their research, they are connected with an available Learning-assistant. The assistants do anything from transcribing interviews to literature reviews, anonymizing or sometimes also support analyzing data. The scheme has been so successful IDI has adopted the concept for themselves.
Publishing and presenting research
Up until now two students have been so involved in research that they have ended up on the author-list. One of them is Bendik Deraas, an IDI student and Excited Learning Assistant, who in 2019 co-authored a paper and presented it at the MNT Conference.
“Writing a scientific article and seeing science in practice is very educational. You get a much better understanding of the scientific method before writing a master’s thesis. I also believe there are very few, even at a university level, who understand how research is done in practice,” he explains when asked about his research experience.