Saving Endangered Turtles

  • Video by Alfonso Velasquez
    Every year, mass numbers of endangered Kemp's ridley sea turtles strand themselves in New England. Doctoral candidate Erin Mangan Sullivan and biology undergrad research assistants Sonia Marcello and Alfred Lutaaya hope their research will assist biologists in making clinical decisions on how to treat these animals.

Learning Through Experience

At UMass Lowell, we engage students early in their college career to participate in meaningful, practical experiences that enrich learning; to prepare students for future work, life and world experiences.

Research co-operative education is a strong component of a student’s experience and offers undergraduate, master's and doctoral students the chance to work side-by-side with leading research professors and professionals in all areas of research.

There are various types of Research and Community Co-ops that offer both research lab and research with faculty (non-laboratory) opportunities. Examples include 

  • working in a campus research laboratory, 
  • helping a community organization, 
  • conducting reviews of program-related scholarship, or 
  • working on a business or marketing plan for a local start-up.

And the many benefits of co-op include facilitating the faculty-student interaction that is uniquely and richly supported at UMass Lowell, helping students learn new skills from hands-on experience that build on the knowledge acquired in the classroom, and providing an awareness of what takes place in a research lab that is working towards a product.

For our undergraduate juniors and seniors who usually round out their undergraduate experience with some of these types of opportunities, co-op helps students to explore their professional and higher education goals while making a valuable contribution in the workplace and community.

The university also has an exciting research opportunities and community initiatives - the Immersive Scholars Program (formerly known as Co-op Scholars) - that allows undergraduate freshman and sophomore students to participate in exciting paid experiential learning opportunities working directly with outstanding faculty across the campus and academic departments or with community partners.