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Transdisciplinary Prevention Research Center Summer Internship Program for Ethnic Minority Undergraduates
to conduct drug abuse research
The Center for Child and Family Policy and the Duke Transdisciplinary Prevention Research Center, in partnership with the Duke Endowment, announce the 2008 Summer Research Internship Program. This ten week internship program is intended for ethnic minority undergraduate Duke students majoring in Economics, Political Science, Public Policy, Psychology and Sociology. Students must be rising seniors, juniors, or sophomores.
The program is designed to provide Duke University undergraduate minority students with meaningful research experience in the areas of drug abuse prevention and intervention. Four interns will be selected to be paired with experienced researchers who will serve as mentors on projects related to the students' interests. Mentors will provide guidance, education, and performance feedback to the interns. Interns will have opportunities to engage in research at a variety of levels, to explore career goals and professional development opportunities, and to improve their research and writing skills. Students with interests and skills in the social or life sciences would receive the greatest benefit from collaborating in research at the Center.
Each intern will receive a $4,000 stipend for the 10 week program and a $750 research fund.
BACKGROUND
The Duke Transdisciplinary Prevention Research Center was funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse to bring together nationally recognized researchers from multiple disciplines to conduct empirical studies of adolescent social processes related to drug use and to design and test programs within the center including Intrapersonal Social Cognition and Self-Regulation, Interpersonal Processes and Peer Influence, and Institutional Peer Effects.
The Center's research is based on previous findings which indicate that adolescents at risk for initiating drug use are highly susceptible to peer-influence and are guided by an evolving transactional model of how drug use evolves during adolescence. This model acknowledges child temperament, family disadvantage, and parenting style as early risk factors for later problems involving substance use, but places the greatest emphasis on 1) the biological vulnerability of the adolescent brain, and 2) adolescent peer-influence processes. Current research at the Center draws on adolescents from public schools, juvenile courts, and clinics that serve teenagers.
PROGRAM REQUIREMENTS
- Participants will attend semi-weekly seminars that address a variety of topics pertaining to prevention research, academic and professional development, and skill-building.
- Interns will participate in a field placement of their choice that will provide first-hand experience in the research process. Field placement opportunities may include school-based prevention and intervention efforts, laboratory research on campus, as well as other studies and prevention efforts taking place at the Center.
- In collaboration with their mentors, each intern will write a research paper and make a presentation of their research at the conclusion of the program.
APPLICATION PROCEDURES
Applicants must submit:
• an electronic application form (click here)
• a 1-2 page brief statement of their research career interests
• an official Duke University transcript
• two letters of recommendation
The deadline for completed applications is March 21, 2008. Please send application materials to:
Megan Golonka
Transdisciplinary Prevention Research Center
Center for Child and Family Policy
Room 217 Rubenstein Hall
Box 90545
Durham, NC 27708
mgolonka@duke.edu
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Application Process
- Electronic Application
Questions?
Contact Megan Golonka
919.613.9296
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