Stanford University School of Earth Science

High School Internships

At the School of Earth Sciences, high school students spend 8-10 weeks in the summer working in different laboratories, primarily in the Geological and Environmental Sciences department. The students work on research projects and are supervised directly by graduate students, post docs and lab managers. They volunteer for 15-30 hours per week during the summer. This program enables graduate students to serve as mentors, prepares high schools students for college and serves to strengthen the partnership between Stanford and local high schools.
The application period for 2009 is closed. Thirteen interns have been selected from over 100 well qualified high school students. Here is the 2009 Flyer and Application. Late applications are NOT accepted. Please check the Frequently Asked Questions section.
Contact Jennifer Saltzman for more information.
Frequently Asked Questions


Willie spent his internship working with graduate student Zhibin Wei, and learned about coal and oil. The best part of the internship was "filtering, loved it!"


 
A few quotes from high school interns
  • I loved actually analyzing the data and seeing if the experiment worked out in the end. To see if all of the hard work finally paid off in the end was very gratifying.
  • I learned the overall process of working in a lab and the details of a graduate project. I enjoyed working under the lab hoods.
  • I've never worked in a lab before and I wanted to experience doing that, and also wanted to put the knowledge I learned in school into a realistic context.
  • I... became more confident in the usage of chemicals.
 
What did interns actually do during the summer of 2005?
  • Prepared equipment for field work
  • Ultrasonic extraction of coal samples using organic solvents, roto-evaporation, funnel separation, column chromatograph and compound quantification
  • Learned ARC-GIS 9.0 software by doing ESRI’s online training
  • Soil preparation for CN analysis
  • DNA extractions from environmental samples and cultivated strains, PCR screening of genes from various bacteria, RFLP (fingerprint) analysis of 16S ribosomal RNA genes, DNA quantification and visualization
  • Entered data and graphed data
  • Discussed background material after reading articles

Working in the clean box . . .

Looking at a fossil during a group lunch . . .

Presenting research results at the end of the summer . . .

 

Weighing mud samples in the lab . .

Collecting water samples in the field . . .

2006 Interns on a field trip to the Earthquake Trail

 
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