Over the past semester, eight Madison College students have been working with faculty on research as part of the STEM center undergraduate research program. This semester-long program is designed to give students research experience and mentorship to improve in STEM-related competencies.  

Students applied for the undergraduate research program through the STEM center before the start of the semester. Those selected were paired with Madison College faculty to work on research projects related to their fields of interest. Depending on the nature of their projects, students actively participated in and learned about both doing research in general and about their specific areas of study. 

For instance, student researcher Priyanka Lucey spent the last semester researching Northern Sunfish with faculty mentor Dr. Sofia Refetoff. In particular, Lucey worked to measure the differences between sunfish kept in captivity at the Milwaukee Zoo and those living in the wild. “The growth of fish in the zoo has really slowed down, so that was what we were focused on investigating in my project,” said Lucey, explaining how a researcher at University of Wisconsin Milwaukee had been monitoring the fish in captivity. “We’re looking at data that he’s collected, and I even got to collect data from the Mukwonago River.” 

Although the student researchers were working on separate projects, one thing they had in common was the hands-on portion of their projects. For Lucey, this was going electrofishing with Dr. Refetoff, and taking weight and length measurements of Northern Sunfish, as well as DNA samples. They worked with researchers from UW Milwaukee to compare those measurements with the captive fish from the zoo. 

In addition to being a valuable resource for STEM students to gain experience, research done by Madison College’s undergraduate researchers is also making an impact in their fields of study. “We’re going to actually show [my project] to the Milwaukee Zoo, because they’re looking for recommendations on how they can improve anything to help their fish thrive more,” Lucey explained. 

The research done by Lucey and other students in the undergraduate research program this semester will also be presented at Madison College in the final weeks of the fall semester.