WABI, WVII report on Rapid Research Week at VEMI Lab

WABI (Channel 5) and WVII (Channel 7) reported on the fifth annual Rapid Research Week at the University of Maine’s Virtual Environment and Multimodal Interaction Laboratory (VEMI Lab). Students and faculty collaborate on research, from idea conception to final presentation, the report states. Each group conducted an experiment based on their research question, and presented their findings on Friday. “Just about everybody here is involved in research in some way, whether it’s designing an experiment, or developing, or just brainstorming with somebody else,” said Theo Erikson, an undergraduate developer at the VEMI Lab. “This puts every single person in the lab through the whole process.” “The research team does a good job of breaking it all up to try and make it even so that whatever our weaknesses are, whatever my weakness is, that will be carried by someone else in the group,” said Emily Blackwood, graduate student and senior logistics coordinator at VEMI. “As a faculty member this is also a great benefit for me because I get to learn how to communicate better with the students,” said Caitlin Howell, an assistant professor of biomedical engineering. “I get to work with the one-on-one in small teams on a daily basis and really learn how they’re thinking through these problems. That helps me be a better teacher.”