Students show off their research chops during annual Wellspring Symposium

by Chuck Gordon

The usual hushed environment of the Ethel K. Smith Library's Flag Room was abuzz with the sound of research Tuesday afternoon as undergraduates gave poster presentations during the annual two-day Wellspring Symposium.

Forty students gave prepared, detailed rundowns of the research they've been engaging in this year and then answered questions from attendees, who cycled through as many stations as they could during the hour devoted to this portion of the event.

"This is nerve-wracking," said Victoria Dennehy, a senior exercise science major from Monroe who was presenting on the importance of undertaking an undergraduate internship.

Dennehy needn't have worried. Her well-researched spiel was persuasive and thorough and had an important message for younger students: "Students who do internships are three times more likely to obtain a job than someone with the same credentials who did not do an internship."

This year's Wellspring Symposium is the largest in recent memory, with 150 students taking part on Tuesday and Wednesday. In addition to the undergraduate poster presentations and oral presentations, graduate students from the Doctor of Occupational Therapy, Master of Public Health, and Pharmacy programs also participated, giving either oral or poster presentations.

All students who take part in the symposium walk away with not only increased knowledge but some valuable ancillary skills.

"It's one thing to be in the lab; it's one thing to write up a manuscript," said Dr. Terese Lund, director of undergraduate research and organizer of the event. "But to explain your research really quickly to someone who is a novice on your topic is a very different skill. These students are going to have expertise whatever their field of work is, and being able to explain complicated things in simple ways is a transferable skill that will serve them well, well beyond the undergraduate level."

Students presented on a range of topics from several academic disciplines: international business, chemistry, psychology, marketing, sociology, public health and more. From the design and assembly of a DNA origami nanoreactor to the impact of tax policies on happiness and quality of life, there was something for everyone.

Jessica Thomas and Nikyra Bennett spoke confidently about the findings of their research into the effect the 15th Amendment has had on voting participation among Black men in the United States.

"The 15th Amendment affected voting rights in a positive way, but it was only the first step," said Bennett, a sophomore psychology major from Georgetown, S.C. "We also had the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which helped break down racial barriers, but we're still going through gerrymandering, voter-ID laws, lack of access to polling sites in a lot of low-income minority communities, imprisonment rates. Yes, it did start something good, but a lot of needs are still unmet."

Thomas and Bennett were part of the W'Engage group that spent spring break in Alabama, visiting Montgomery, learning about Martin Luther King, Jr., and walking across the Edmund Pettus Bridge. That trip made their research come alive, and it helped them communicate their results better during the Wellspring.

"Doing this research taught me how to ask the right questions," said Thomas, a senior communication major from Orlando, Fla. "Formulating your ideas into complete scholarly-level thoughts is the main thing. It's easy to do the research, but then we learned how to explain it at a college level."

Jessica Capes, a senior exercise science major from Mebane who played varsity soccer at Wingate, leaned into her background in athletics to investigate different ways athletes recover during training. She researched individual studies and meta-analyses that studied different recovery modalities - active recovery, hydrotherapies and massage - and drew her own conclusions.

"The conclusion I came up with is that what is best for the athlete is to do multiple recovery modalities rather than just one," she says.

Capes' research project was a requirement of the Honors College. She said that since she's in the Honors College's "traditional" track, she could have completed a project in any field of study. She considered religion but decided that exercise science might serve her better, since she's enrolling in Western Carolina University's physical therapy program after graduation.

"I was like, 'Yeah, this might help me down the road,'" Capes said.

Although two Master of Public Health students gave a poster presentation on Tuesday, the majority of graduate students were well represented during other parts of the Wellspring Symposium. Eleven groups of pharmacy students and five groups of OTD students gave poster presentations earlier on Tuesday, while three groups of pharmacy students gave oral presentations.

The inclusion of graduate students was a point of emphasis this year, Lund said.

"This is an opportunity to shine a bright light on the amazing work our graduate students are doing who often are siloed off and not integrated into many of these signature campus events," she said.

Grad or undergrad, students in past Wellspring Symposiums have reported a host of positive outcomes from explaining their research to their peers and mentors.

"I always do a postparticipation survey, and to a person they say that their confidence improved, their interpersonal skills improved, their knowledge and depth of understanding improved," Lund said. "They feel like they own the material after today."

Lund said that another Wellspring Symposium will be held in the fall.

Learn more about undergraduate research at Wingate University.

April 17, 2024

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