I think I am still naive about research and about how much work goes into making a project. Even after being through the process once, it’s still hard to believe everything that had to be done. But I believe the Aresty program has helped me to find things I’m interested in—such as narrowing my research interests. I have found such satisfaction from learning about a different culture and the problems they encounter. However, that has left me unsatisfied because I do not know what to do to help them. So, I guess what I’d like to explore further are the policy implications of this research. It will definitely help me to take classes that deal with inequality in developing nations and to see how such problems are mitigated.

Research is an extremely thorough activity—this kind of behavior has been prevalent in my other classes because of research I have had to do for papers and projects. However, I have also found this type of behavior in other areas like dance. I was a choreographer for the Rutgers Performing Dance Company this past semester and it’s made me realize how thorough I have to be in this process as well. The method of research has made the most impact in other parts of my life.

To: Senator Kip Bateman
The institution of a three-year pilot program that will provide instruction in personal finance to high school seniors will help teach the next generation about the importance of money and responsibility. It is this next generation that will influence the direction that our great country proceeds in—growing up skeptical of our financial system, their young minds need to be taught how our economy functions and what their role is in the financial world. In time, this bill will aid in restoring faith in our financial system and will facilitate bringing our economy back to its feet.

We fully support this bill and what is attempted to be accomplished by its enactment. However, the issues of responsibility, money, debt, etc. are important ones that should be taught to children from a young age. At Rutgers University, we have begun a project concerning economics and children where this website (http://econkids.rutgers.edu) provides a resource to teachers, parents, and volunteers who want to introduce the topic of economics to children. The website features books published from 2006 to 2009, as well as books organized strictly by economic concept. It is a user-friendly website with a mission to bring the world of economics to the youngest generation. We hope you can make a few visits to this website over the coming months and generate a few ideas for legislation that will teach students of all ages about the importance of financial responsibility.

This letter shows how I have related what I have been learning over this past year into policies and legislations in the present. I had to use my research skills to understand the background of the bill and then relate our project to it.

I see myself as the same in that I am still interested in psychology, social-emotional learning, and issues related to schools. I believe that I am different because I have learned a great deal about the research process, graduate study, and statistics. I also have a clearer idea about the career path that I want to pursue.
While I did find interesting results, I was not able to determine if there was an interaction between school size and socioeconomic status in my study. In the future, I could use a sample that would allow for certain tests to be performed.

The one thing that has stayed constant through this experience is my drive and continued interest in the subject of social entrepreneurship and the strive to relay this information to the public through programs such as the Byrne Seminar. Unlike some research which might involve redundant exercises and reading, this is a field that is constantly changing and evolving and because of this fact, we too must change and evolve what we are trying to teach and how we try to teach the material. Saying this, much has changed since we first started in September. I personally now feel much more comfortable with creating resources to teach from and now know so much more about where to look and how to present information in a way that is not only informative, but also interesting and inspiring. At the beginning I think everyone including myself was a bit lost on how to approach this subject simply because it was such a new idea and there was not many examples to draw off of. Now I have a better understanding of where to look, what information to pull and how to present it in a clear and concise manner. I think this is one of the best parts of undergraduate research, being able to learn and develop one’s skills through academia. One might be surprised how many skills can be learned or developed from this kind of research.

In what ways do you see yourself as the same as when you began the Aresty RA program? In what ways do you see yourself as different? What questions has your experience raised for you to explore in the future? How might you go about doing that?

I think that I still possess a great interest in social action projects and engaging others, especially my fellow peers, in such activities. Now I see myself as a person who has a better understanding of what an entrepreneur does and how to become one. This research project has provided me with a more lucid understanding that it is possible to use business and wanting to help people to create positive change in one’s community. This research project has also given be a better understanding of what I want to do with my future. I wish to get a Masters in Global Public Health and now an MBA in Global Management.

My research of Social Entrepreneurship has helped me better understand what motivates students to be invovled in social action projects. I am currently involved in various global development organizations and I did a lot of research on Nobel Peace Prize winner, Dr. Muhammad Yunus's, microfinance project. Oxfam Rutgers has recently hosted a benefit fashion show to raise funds and awareness for microfinance organzation KIVA. I have also learned a lot about what social entrepreneurship is and I have developed a strong interest in applying the business aspects to social action projects, something that I am passionate about. This research experience has helped me realize that I want to pursue an MBA in Global Development. I never clearly understood that business and social change/global development can be implemented with each other. My research has opened many doors for me to explore and to expand my knowledge and interests for my future.

I have seen connections between my research experience and my activities both within and outside the classroom. Some of the skills (e.g. using Excel and SPSS) I have acquired during my research experience have helped me with my schoolwork. In my psychology classes, I was able to apply what I have learned through research to what I was reading in the text and hearing during lecture.

Because I want to become a teacher, I spend a lot of time outside of Rutgers in elementary and secondary classrooms. My research about developing safe and civil schools has tied into these field experiences. I am able to see firsthand the importance of social-emotional learning, the effects of bullying, and other issues that my lab is involved in. Because of my position as a research assistant, I have begun to critically examine what I observe in the classroom and long-term implications of certain practices, policies, incidents, etc.

A topic that I really learned more about in detail was microfinance and Nobel Peace Prize winner, Dr. Muhammad Yunus’s Grameen Bank project. He is a successful entrepreneur who started a global program that provides loans to the poor so that they can lift themselves out of poverty. The results of his project are remarkable and the structure of microfinance is sweeping across the world. Dean Matsuda asked us to focus a lot on the way Dr. Yunus started his project and what kind of resources and strategies he used to be a successful entrepreneur for his microfinance project. We compiled this information in power point presentations for his Bryne Seminar class and during one of the sessions, two Rutgers students who started their own microfinance project in New Brunswick also came and spoke about becoming social entrepreneurs. From this type of research I learned that students are better able to ‘see’ and realize that it is possible for them to become social entrepreneurs as well. Although there are challenges, they can reach their goals. It is sometimes easier to see a Rutgers peer talk about his experience compared to a lecturer because students can relate to other students. I think this methodology of teaching and research is more effective than reading from a text book.

Below is a Staff Climate Survey Summary Report by Gender for a high school (sorry about the formatting issues). There are nine questions listed and the means are reported for each of them by gender. The number of people who answered each question is listed below the mean. This is an example of one of the reports that I am responsible for doing independently.


Support and Care For Parents Support and Care By and for Staff Student Respect Friendship and Belonging Students Shaping Their Environment Professional
Interaction Effective Discipline Supportive Leadership Appraisal and Recognition
Mean 3.87 4.09 3.63 3.53 3.54 4.05 3.86 3.31 4.13
n 56 56 56 56 56 56 56 56 56

Mean 3.93 4.15 3.99 3.94 3.69 3.98 3.70 3.20 3.96
n 27 27 27 27 27 27 27 27 27

Throughout much of the semester, one of my main duties has been to take the date we are focusing on and researching into power point presentations that will engage students and break down the material a little better. A great example of the kind of presentations that I created is the one centered around Muhammad Yunus and the arrival of the Grameen Bank in America. In this presentation, we tried to tie together how real social entrepreneurship companies operate, why they do what they do, and what implications this has for the country/world. Not only did we include basic information about the Bank and the man behind micro-finance, we also included actual examples from around the world that directly apply to the class and allow students to see real life examples that will hopefully allow them to better understand the concepts better.

Another presentation that I feel is quite unique to the class is the presentation based off the book “Campus CEO” but Randal Pinkett. This Rutgers alumni recently won the hit show, “The Apprentice” and went on to write a book to help college students/entrepreneurs who want to establish a business on their campus or elsewhere. It was written in a way simple manner in order to provide the clearest way to do such a task. Also in this presentation, we connected the many organizations and resources that are available to students and small businesses to help them succeed and grow. Luckily, Rutgers’ “Spotlight” on its homepage focused on the same topic so we created slides that provided students with the resources and initiatives around Rutgers and NJ that could help them. The key to this class is to give the students the information and resources they need to create their own businesses.

All the presentations we create try to connect the basic information we aim to teach along with practical information and resources they students can use in the “real world.” We are preparing them to go out and have the skills to actually go about business through this new model of social entrepreneurship. Our presentations are unique and this reflects the uniqueness of the topic and the type of business the social entrepreneurship is creating throughout the world.

I'm researching healthcare access for the elderly in Cambodia. This will help us understand what this group is and isn't getting from the healthcare system. This can also lead to policy changes that will reformat the system for the better.

I knew beforehand that everything has to be cited, but I didn't realize to what extent everyone else's work has to be cited.

Our research project was on social entrepreneurship, combining social action tools and a business model to bring about positive change in our community.

I never realized that surveys require as much effort to create them as it is to evaluate them. There were so many little ‘questions’ that came up when were determining which questions to include because we didn’t want to the survey to be too long. There were some issues with the survey distribution because they could have been biased or flawed. I think that the important thing I learned from the surveys was to not completely generalize the results to all students and to make sure that we do not include any information that may be false.

It is really exciting to know that the research Bobby and I are doing on social entrepreneurship is actually being applied to students in the present and hopefully the future. There are many social action projects that are currently being spearheaded by students and faculty including the Intersect Fund, a non-profit organization that provides microfinance loans to local New Brunswick residents. Recently, a faculty member met with President McCormick on establishing a Social Entrepreneurship branch to Rutgers academia. We had to come up with different ideas and proposals on how social action could be applied to our studies and how students can be involved. It is really exciting to see our research having an affect on students and hopefully the future of the Rutgers academic curriculum.

The objective of our project is to introduce the newly developing concept of social entrepreneurship (social business) to freshman at Rutgers University as a Byrne Seminar.

Regarding ethics, I really have not learned anything too new, I have always been aware of plagiarism and citing one’s sources and in this case it is no different. As far as responsibility, I realize how important it is to take responsibility regarding due dates and things that my professor asks for (power points, readings, etc). Since he is teaching a class, it is important to make sure he has all the necessary materials to teach and engage and we are responsible for providing many of the materials since we are the RA’s. For the most part we have done a very good job at keeping on schedule and providing the class with well thought out, detailed materials and presentations..

My project is about school climate, which is the quality of school life, and if and how it differs in high-SES schools and low-SES schools.

Ethics/responsible conduct in research has not come up yet in my research.

When I met with my professor last week, she told me that our paper has pretty much been accepted by the IAFFE so that we can give a joint presentation on our paper in June. This is an exciting development for me because it legitimizes the work I've been doing this past semester and gives me a tangible benefit at the end of the semester to look forward to. It shows me that hard work and perseverance can really pay off and that I can get my ideas out to the world.

As I reread the contract my mentor and I created earlier this year, I was surprised to see that what I have accomplished and what I am doing now is a direct reflection of the learning goals we amassed earlier. I guess I was surprised because I didn't remember what goals we had set and what we were aiming for. Having the goals in front of me made me realize how far we've come together and how much we've accomplished.

We've really got on track with research this semester by submitting an abstract to a journal and a conference for acceptance. This has given us both motivation to forge forward on this joint project and accomplish what we set out to do. Having a joint interest on the paper topic has also allowed my professor and I to branch out from our comfort zones and take on a project that must be completed in short duration but also be thorough and compelling.

Last semester was okay. My professor and I started off really well, accomplishing what we set out to do each week and just really being on top of things. Towards the end of the semester, things kept piling up and pushing other things to the back of the table so that things were accomplished less quickly and with less communication. That's probably my biggest dissatisfaction with last semester-- not the lack of communication per se, but the lessening of it as the semester got into full swing towards the end of November/beginning of December. But other than that, things definitely went well. I learned a lot from my professor and my peers, and all in all, just got to meet a great group of people.

Although our lessons on social entrepreneurship are largely taught from an international perspective, we have always talked about and tried to make it applicable to the local community as well because this brings the lessons full circle. Recently we were contacted by Dean Matsuda with a small side project. He was contacted by Dr Maurice Elias, the head of CESEP (our community service unit at Rutgers) who wants to create a civic engagement center here at Rutgers. Dr. Elias actually needs to present his idea to President McCormick this week so we were asked to help him come up with ideas as to how and why social entrepreneurship can be used at Rutgers and specifically in this potential civic center to help out the community near and far. This is an exciting development because it not allows us to connect what we’ve been learning/teaching to a real life situation, but it also shows how popular and helpful social entrepreneurship is becoming in the global community. Hopefully we will be able to come up with some concrete ideas that will draw enough interest from the president and the school to push this project into a real development stage and from there….who knows?!

Recently I have moved forward with choosing the schools I will be using for my research project. In order to do this, I need to assign each school in our project with the appropriate District Factor Group (DFG). I will then choose a group of schools that have a high DFG and another group of schools that have a low DFG. School size will be a consideration during this process. This is an important step in my project because once this is done I can analyze the data that has already been collected.