A great way to continue to develop your research interests and find research opportunities can be to start with people you already know! Consider the following:

• Professors you have taken classes with/ are currently enrolled in their class (stop by their office hours!);
• Faculty Fellows of Residential College;
• Peers and Classmates;
• Friends already involved in research;
• Teaching assistants;
• Events/Calendar page for your department (look for seminars and events where people share scholarly work).

Talk to these people and pick their brains! Share your interests and your story about why you’re interested in those things. Ask them who you should be talking to and what you should be reading given your interests– chances are, if they’re in a similar field they’ll be able to refer you to applicable readings and people. These conversations can be helpful because they can give you meaningful recommendations based on the things that you discussed instead of having to blindly search through Google Scholar or another database. Even if they aren’t an exact match to what you’re interested in, they still might be able to give you direction!

Pay attention to how you’re telling your story too– notice how it changes depending on who you’re telling, what you add or redact, etc. This introspection can also help you develop your interests and give you a clearer picture of what you’re curious about.

Think about this process like building a wheel where you are at the center and faculty members/other people are the spokes. The more people you start to interact with and talk to, the more stable you and your research will be! The goal of meeting with and finding faculty is to build an “academic network.” Even if you don’t end up directly working with a faculty member, you never know how they can be helpful in the future! Whether it be changing labs or getting expert advice on an area of your project that needs developing (or even if you want to take a class they’re offering the next quarter!), it can be easier to reach out to someone if you’ve already started developing a relationship with them!

Department websites can be a really good resource for finding people that do work you’re interested in.

• To get there, you can either google “Northwestern” and the department name or check out NU’s list of majors and minors to explore different areas and the research involved in each. 
• Focus on the “People” or “Faculty” section to identify individuals whose research seems exciting to you.

• If you need help narrowing down faculty, check and see if you can sort by subfield. For example, in Biology you can sort faculty by “Molecular Sciences” and “Plant Biology and Conservation,” and in Anthropology you can sort by “Archaeology,” “Biological Anthropology,” “Cultural Anthropology,” and “Linguistics”.

• To look for people, open different tabs for faculty members you find interesting and take a look at their research interests, biography, and selected publications. If you’re not interested, don’t worry and focus on the ones that you do like!

In your search for interesting people, you’ll come across a variety of different academic rankings. Here’s a quick guide to what they are and what they do!

• Graduate Student: masters or doctoral student
• Postdoctoral Scholar: has PhD, usually research is their main focus
• Research Professor: beyond postdoc, usually research is primary job
• Adjunct Professor: Short-term contract primarily for teaching
• Instructor: hired to teach, may or may not conduct research
• Assistant Professor: tenure track, research AND teaching
• Associate Professor: received tenure, research AND teaching
• Professor: tenured, progressed through all faculty ranks
• Professor Emeritus: retired with distinction, involvement varies

Once you have a list of faculty you’re interested in, keep digging to learn more about them! 

• Google their names to see if they have a personal page or lab website.
• Learn about their role at the institution!
  • How long have they been there? What is their job title? 
  • What department(s) are they affiliated with? Do they hold any additional jobs that might impact their ability to serve as a research mentor?  
  • What courses (if any) do they teach? Is there a class you can take?
• Learn more about their research and ongoing projects:
  • What topics do they work on? What publications or creative work were recently completed relating to the topic that interests you most?
  • What methodologies did they use to complete this work? Do you know what this methodology is? Can you take a course on it?

In your search, dig deeper than the information on their faculty profile on the department page! You’re gearing up to make a first impression, and knowing a lot about them and their interests can show your motivation!

If you’re interested in working with Feinberg faculty, sometimes it can be difficult to discern which faculty members have active research (often, in addition to their other roles, such as clinicians). One strategy is to pretend you are a prospective graduate student, since PhD programs are functionally research degrees.

Similarly, you can work with faculty in other Northwestern schools such as Kellogg.

This approach also doesn’t have to be limited to Northwestern! If you’re interested in doing work at another institution, perhaps near your home, just substitute “Northwestern” with the other institution’s name AND “department name.”

Once you’ve identified people that you’re interested in learning more about, you might be wondering “…so what next?”

It’s important that you have a moment of self-reflection before moving forward and figure out what it is that you want! What is your goal of going through this process? Is it to join a lab or a research group? Is it to consult experts and you develop your own project idea? Keep your goals in mind as you proceed through the research journey.