Contents

• General Information
• Supervising Undergrads Working for Research Credit
  • Two Weeks Out Checklist
  • Grading Research Credit Undergrads (Grading Scale)
• Supervising Undergrads Working for Pay
• Departure

General Information

Undergrads play a key role in the success of our community. They provide quality labwork in exchange for research credit or pay (scroll down for this info). They also get the experience of working in a real, cutting-edge research lab.

As a supervisor, you are responsible for ensuring your students are adequately oriented to the specific project they will be working on and the larger CHM Community.

When an undergrad is first hired on as a paid student hourly or is authorized to register for research credit in the labs for the first time, they must schedule an orientation meeting with the Undergraduate Coordinator Jane Lambert (jane.lambert@wisc.edu) to do the prep work for their new role and to go over the requirements and expectations that come with it. As their supervisor, you are most definitely invited to sit in on that meeting.

Two Weeks Out Checklist

Supervisors are strongly encouraged to review this checklist 2-3 weeks after hiring a new undergrad to double-check that important onboarding items have been completed. Contact Jane Lambert (jane.lambert@wisc.edu) with any questions.

Two Weeks Out Hiring Checklist

Supervising Undergrads Working for Research Credit

During the Fall and Spring semesters, undergrads typically do research credit since our community requires every paid student to commit to 2 semesters of research credit (to balance out the time and effort we put into their training). This means that they'll actually be registering in a class (usually led by Dr. Davidson and typically run through the Psychology department ), and the research work that they do with you will apply towards the credits they earn and grade that they are awarded in that class.
With Jane Lambert's assistance, they will register for 1 - 5 credits and will be required to put in at least 45 hours of lab work per credit, per Psychology department guidelines. In addition to lab work, research credit students must complete a semester project, participate in a project peer review, and attend FAN meetings. See Research Credit Student Requirements.

When working with research credit students, you will assume the role of their day-to-day mentor (Richie will be the overarching mentor as the "course" instructor), and thus, you should know and understand what is expected of credit students.

As a mentor for undergrads working for research credit, you'll be expected to do several things:

• Before the start of the semester, determine which students you're interested in bringing into your research efforts. One place to look for them is on the applicants list
• If possible, meet very early in the semester, or before the semester starts, to discuss their semester paper and the labwork they'll be doing for you. Make sure that their expectations of what they'll be doing are in line with your research needs and that you'll be able to provide enough work for them to reach their 45-hour-per-credit requirements (or that you can "loan" them to another supervisor who can make up the difference).
  
  • Make sure you are aware of the course the student is enrolled in, as that will impact their expectations and, ultimately, your time commitment to them (i.e. senior thesis, URS, or Bio152 students require more mentoring than someone enrolled in Psychology 621)
  • One requirement for most students working for credit is attending the monthly FAN meetings, and a requirement for you as the supervisor would be to LEAD A FAN MEETING. Work with Jane Lambert to schedule.
• Oversee their labwork for you throughout the semester. Provide ongoing feedback on the quality of their work.
• Check in with the students to see if they are working enough hours to meet their credit requirements. It is the student's responsibility to ensure this happens and to communicate to you if they believe they won't be able to work enough hours by the end of the semester, but it doesn't hurt for you to double-check with them. See Tracking Research Credit Hours
• Mid-semester, meet to review the rough draft of their semester paper. Give them constructive criticism on the paper, and guidance on how to shape the final version. This is also a good opportunity to give a more structured, formal review of their labwork performance and to provide suggestions for improvements for the remainder of the semester.
• Close to the end of the semester, receive the final versions of their semester papers. Review the papers and their lab work, and use these to determine a grade recommendation for each student. Pass the recommendations on to Jane Lambert, who will compile everything for Dr. Davidson. Dr. Davidson will use his best judgment, based on your recommendation, his review of the semester papers, and other factors, to assign the final grade to each student.
• At the end of each semester, do an evaluation of each student and ask them to evaluate you. More info can be found here: Undergraduate Evaluations

Grading Research Credit Undergrads (Grading Scale)

Supervising Undergrads Working for Pay

During the summer semester, or after at least 2 semesters of research credit work, undergrads can be hired as student hourly employees to work on research projects. This means that they'll be employees of the State of Wisconsin, working for pay. As their supervisor for pay, you'll be expected to:

• Seek out and hire students who are eligible to be student hourlies. More information on the process can be found here: Hiring Undergrads. Oftentimes, students who have been working for research credit during the spring semester will be interested in student hourly work during the summer. Research credit activity does not imply or guarantee paid work for students later on in the labs.
• Oversee the students' work throughout the semester. Provide ongoing feedback on the quality of their work.
• Ensure that they are not working too many hours per day or too many hours per week, as stipulated by Wisconsin law, UW rules, and community policy. In general, no more than 5:59 hours per shift, 8 hours total per day, 29 hours total per week, or 58 hours total per 2-week pay cycle.
• Every other Monday, log into HRS, review their time records, and approve them. The students won't get paid until you do this, so be sure that you have computer access on those Mondays or that the HR office has someone set up as your delegate in the system. Having a delegate is a relatively permanent assignment, not something you could set up any time you're out of the office.
• At the end of each semester, do an evaluation of each student and ask them to evaluate you. More info can be found here: Undergraduate Evaluations

Undergrads can also be work-study. This is very similar to working as a student hourly. The main difference is in how they are paid; their pay comes in part from a federal work-study program and in part from our usual funding sources. All of the pay details are handled by the payroll department, and you won't need to worry about them. The other difference is that work-study students are typically exempt from the 2 semester of research credit rule.

Please see Pay Rates and Raises for information on compensation and raises.

Departure

The last day a graduating undergraduate can work (unless they have registered for graduate-level classes at any institution): 

• Summer 2024: May 18, 2024

See: CHM Undergrads - Departure Checklist