Featured image is of members of the the Laboratory for the Study and Prevention of Suicide-Related Conditions and Behaviors.
It goes without saying that the biggest high of the entire IDEA Grant process was receiving the award itself. By the time the IDEA Grant application was due in February 2024, I was already into the prospectus semester of my honors in the major project – which is what the grant funded – and I had to balance writing a full prospectus draft alongside this application. To say the least…it was a very stressful couple of weeks. Despite the stress, lates nights, and countless amounts of caffeine, the payoff of submitting my prospectus was well worth it. Up until that point, I had never felt such a sense of pleasure and self-gratitude from completing a draft, at least academically speaking (I also write in my free time). I am extremely grateful for all of the wonderful people within the Joiner Lab. If it weren’t for the guidance, scholarly resources, and emotional support I received from all of the people featured in the picture below, this project would not be in the condition it is in currently, if in any condition at all.
Second to actually receiving the award itself, attaining approval from FSU’s Institutional Review Board (IRB) was another big highlight of the IDEA Grant [implementation] process. Following the submission of my prospectus draft, I spent the next month or so writing the protocol for my project. It would be an understatement to say that this was the most complicated thing I had ever written, and I was more than relieved when my IRB coordinator approved the protocol. Ironically, the approval of my IRB protocol and the significance that it carried also served as a low point in the IDEA Grant process, as the realization that I now had to begin the participant recruitment process (after months of waiting on IRB approval) was very overwhelming in the beginning.
Some other highs worth mentioning were going around and hanging up flyers for my study, and getting the first email notification that someone had filled out my eligibility survey. Both of those were very surreal, full-circle moments. The biggest low by far – more so coinciding with the IDEA Grant [implementation] process than anything else – was dealing with FSU’s Office of Financial Aid (OFA), and having the university deduct money (essentially) from additional, separate grants that I had applied for and received. Not only was it frustrating and confusing having to coordinate emails between myself, my father (who is in-charge of my FSU finances), and OFA, but also losing those additional sources of funding meant that I wouldn’t be able to afford to compensate as many participants now. Another, unrelated, source of stress stemmed from my inability to complete a focus group before the end of the Summer 2024 semester, which was due to the length of the IRB approval process. However, I am a lot less worried about this now, as I have enough participants on standby that I plan on reaching out to, come Fall.
The process of implementing the IDEA Grant reinforced the importance of preparation. For example, even when writing this blog post, I did a brainstorming session (in preparation) where I wrote informally because I knew it would lessen the overall amount of time spent on this assignment. Not to say that I didn’t do a lot of things for my project in preparation, such as inquiring about gift card payments, informing lab members of their roles, etc. There were also some things I physically couldn’t prepare for because I had to wait for one thing to get approved before I could go on and create/complete another. But some things, such as creating Qualtrics surveys, fleshing out my literature review, and creating email scripts, I put off because I was overwhelmed. Additionally, this project reinforced the importance of breaking things down step-by-step to help with feeling overwhelmed.
My biggest takeaway, by far, from this process was the realization that – currently speaking – research is not enough of a passion of mine to pursue it in graduate school (however it could change, for instance my therapist is going back and getting her Ph.D.). This realization has and will continue to directly influence the opportunities I am looking at beyond undergraduate education – which in-and-of-itself could be viewed as one big project. On somewhat of a philosophical level, everything we do cumulates into one big project: life. This specific chapter [involving undergraduate research] taught me to be more honest with myself, and do things for myself and not because others hold some expectation that I will do said thing. To this end, I know that pursuing becoming a therapist will make me happy – the idea of helping people through therapy brings me tangible happiness.
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