SUMMER SCIENCE RESEARCH
EXCHANGE PROGRAM - 2007

COLLEGE ST. BENEDICT/ST. JOHN'S UNIVERSITY 

and SOUTHWEST UNIVERSITY

Collegeville/St. Joseph, MN      Beibei, Chongqing, China

Notifcations of acceptance have been delayed til Monday to be certain that all funding for selected students is in place.  Sorry for the delay.

Program Description

To continue and strengthen our relationship between the College of St. Benedict (CSB)/St. John's University (SJU), USA, and Southwest University (SWU), China, and to provide busy science majors an opportunity to study and travel abroad, we have developed a summer research exchange program between CSB/SJU and SWU. 

Director of Exchange Program:  Henry Jakubowski, Dept. Chemistry

Duration: 12 weeks total.  CSB/SJU students leave for China on Thursday, May 17, 2007 and will spend six weeks at SWU doing research.  CSB/SJU and SWU students will return to CSB/SJU on June 30,  and continue research until August 10, 2007.

Program: CSB/SJU students with majors in Biology, Biochemistry, Chemistry, Mathematics, Psychology, and/or Physics, selected by application and based on merit and interest, will travel to SWU, China on the weekend before the research program begins. Each student will work in a lab with a partner SWU student, selected in advance by application and merit, and reasonably fluent in English, and under the direction of a faculty director who has agreed to participate.  After six weeks, the SWU students, with their CSB/SJU partners, will travel to CSB/SJU and work on a research project with their SWU partner, under the direction of a CSB/SJU faculty director, who has agreed to participate.   

Housing: Chinese students will be housed in the same facilities on campus as CSB/SJU students. CSB/SJU students who travel to SWU will be housed in the International Student Dormitory.  Housing expenses for both CSB/SJU students at SWU and SWU students at CSB/SJU will be completely covered by financial support (see Support below).

Food:  CSB/SJU students will pay for their own food at CSB/SJU and at SWU.  Likewise, SWU students will pay for their own food at CSB/SJU.  However, CSB/SJU students will be given funds by SWU to cover food cost at SWU ($25/week).  Likewise, they will be given funds ($59.33/week) to cover food costs at CSB/SJU.  SWU will also be given funds to cover food costs at CSB/SJU.

Support: Participating CSB/SJU students will receive all of the usual ten week summer financial salary provided by CSB/SJU, even though they will only work here at CSB/SJU for six weeks.  The extra payment will help the study difer two costs, airfare (approximately $1550)and a program fee ($1000).  The program fee is necessary to fund the support of the SWU students (each around $800) and faculty director (approximately $1200) during their six week stay at CSB/SJU.  The financial stipend will be supplemented with funds to cover food costs at SWU (1000 RMB total or $120 total, provided by SWU) and at CSB/SJU ($356.40 total in six weeks, provided by CSB/SJU).  addition to this, SWU will cover the cost of housing CSB/SJU students in the International Student Dormitory.  CSB/SJU will provide funds to CSB/SJU students ($300 total in six weeks) to cover housing at CSB/SJU.

Travel: All CSB/SJU and SWU students will pay for their own transportation costs to and from CSB/SJU and SWU and within each country.   CSB/SJU students will fly to and from China as a group on the same flight.  We will land in Beijing on a Friday and leave for SWU on Monday.  Lodging, food, and sightseeing costs in Beijing (approximately $100) will be paid by students.

Students: All SWU students must have a CSB/SJU partner who will be their primary �peer mentor�. Hence an equal number of students from both SWU and CSB/SJU will participate.  The number of students from each major will be determined by We will select 2 students each from Biology, Biochemistry, Chemistry and Physics. 

Selection Process:  Students should submit application forms by Friday, January 26, 2007 to Henry Jakubowski, Chemistry Department.  Selection of students into the program will occur no later than February 5, Monday, to ensure that student will have sufficient time to obtain passports and visas.

Orientation: There will be a series of orientation sessions in Spring 07 for students who are selected into the program.  They will consist of important information about how to travel to, life, work, and thrive in China.  Dates will be announced.

Application Forms:  All forms should be printed, filled out by the appropriate person, and mailed by campus mail to Henry Jakubowski, Dept. Chemistry, 245 ASC, CSB. (Telephone: 5354)

1.  Department Forms: Summer Undergraduate Research Applications.  For students interested in biochemistry, choose the form for the department in which their probable research mentor is housed.

 2.  International Education Forms: - Summer Student Research Exchange Program Applications

Summary of Important Dates: 

Note:  Applications are due 1/26 Friday as stated below.  The links above indicate 1/25, which reflects last year's deadline.

For more details contact Henry Jakubowski

02/09/2007