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GUNTHER ROLAND: There's
a couple of new elements

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that we've introduced
in the last few years,

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one is that the students write
a proposal for an experiment

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that they want to do
and develop themselves.

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And for that experiment,
they can use any material

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that we have in the lab
or anything that they

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can find at MIT and other
labs of former UROP advisors,

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or people that they know.

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And sometimes we even buy
some equipment for them

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if it's a particularly
interesting proposal

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and we think that
the equipment can

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be used in future experiments.

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So that proposal, develop
your own experiment

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and really see through
the whole process,

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not starting from a
prefabricated experiment,

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but coming up with
your own, that's

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a really unique
experience in 8.14.

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I think something
that is very difficult

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to find outside of the lab.

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And then we also have
included in the last two years

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a poster session at the end
where the students present

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the results of
their own experiment

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to the other students in
the lab, to the staff,

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and then to any member of
the physics department that

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happens to walk past.

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So we tried to time that with
the physics faculty lunch,

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so that the big professors
walk past the posters,

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and then the students
can explain to them

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their own experiment,
what they found

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in that part of the course.

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So I think that's really
different than that

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and what do you do in 8.13 when
you start with experiments that

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have been done by generations
and generations of students

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before.

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And I think students
really like that.