We welcome all students to consider joining our team!
We frequently have room for volunteer undergraduates to learn how to sort plankton samples or dissect fish to remove otoliths. For those of you who are interested in conducting further advanced research, talk with us about independent projects and/or applying for summer research support. Feel free to reach out to Su Sponaugle or any of the lab graduate students.
We hope you are interested in our research and will consider joining our team! If you are wondering whether the Plankton Ecology Lab would be a good fit, here are some rough guidelines.
Some of the characteristics that may help you succeed in graduate school are if you:
If you think you meet many of these criteria, take some time to read a few of the publications from our lab. If you are interested in the type of research we conduct, feel free to contact Su Sponaugle to discuss details. Admission to the Department of Integrative Biology (IB) at Oregon State University is a multi-step process.
New graduate students will likely spend their first year on the Corvallis campus, taking classes and getting started on developing their research project. Future years would involve increasing time in the lab at the Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport. Students in our lab typically work on a topic related to the major avenues of ongoing research in the lab, with flexibility in the specific direction of their research and opportunities to develop new lines of inquiry.
We strongly encourage prospective students to seek external sources of funding (such as the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program and NOAA’s Dr. Nancy Foster Scholarship Program) to enhance the likelihood of admission. Note that once onboard, in addition to their own research, students are expected to be team players and assist with broader lab projects, including those of other graduate students. For more information on the application process, see the IB Dept webpage for Future Graduate Students.
Depending on our research grants, we sometimes have openings for Postdoctoral Fellows. To enquire, please contact Su Sponaugle. Permanent staff positions are few and far between as these necessitate continuous, dedicated grant funding. If we have any positions open, we’ll advertise them on the OSU Jobs page.