Sebastian Fernandez (EE PhD candidate), Arynn Gallegos (EE PhD candidate), Claire Anderson (Environmental Engineering PhD candidate) and Chandler Brown (Environmental Engineering PhD candidate) organized SERI as a means of providing students with the tools they need to successfully complete undergraduate research and apply to graduate school.

"Stanford Engineering Research Introductions (SERI) aims to empower underrepresented underclassmen at Stanford and other institutions to achieve their academic and professional goals both in college and after graduation, state Sebastian and Arynn.

"The program's fundamental objectives are to expose students early in their undergraduate careers to academic research, provide graduate student and faculty mentoring, and cultivate a community of likeminded and diverse scholars."

SERI's inaugural conference kicked off Friday, February 4, 2022. The two-day event included faculty panels, graduate student panels, lab tours, seminars, and research presentations by faculty.

EE professors Dan Congreve and Chelsea Finn gave presentations on their research. Dan's research includes controlling light at the nanoscale. And Chelsea presented on broad robot generalization with broad offline data. Additional engineering faculty participated in panels, lab tours, and workshops.

Conference participants said they learned a lot and are now more clear on the path to becoming a graduate student.

SERI organizers are grateful to the EE department for generously supporting and sponsoring this program, as well as VPGE Diversity and Inclusion Innovation Funds and the ChemE, CEE, and CS departments.

"We look forward to hosting the program in future years to reach and impact the next generation of diverse scientists and engineers."