CURI Academic Year Researcher Fall 25 - Gittins

Job Title: CURI Academic Year Researcher

Classification: Student Employee (non-exempt)

Name and Address of Employer: St. Olaf College, 1520 St. Olaf Ave, Northfield, MN 55057

If the position requires the student to work off campus, provide the name and address here:

Department Name: CURI

Unit Number (5 digits): 16118

Length of Position: See Employment Authorization  

Contact Person/Supervisor: Faculty advisor

Pay Rate (Check One)     Standard Hourly Rate  x  Supervisory/Special Skills Hourly Rate

Description of the Position: (Purpose of the Position): Students work together with a faculty member on scholarly or artistic projects. 

Project Title: Sustainable Composites - Chemistry/Engineering Lab Research

Project Description: The SMART Composites Lab at St Olaf is working with an industrial partner in the UK (Adjacency Group Ltd.) to develop  recyclable composites from renewable feedstocks as well as the industrial technology to manufacture them. Current generation composites are not recyclable and generate significant end-of-life waste which offsets much of the benefits of using composites from a sustainability perspective. These fall semester CURI projects will be looking at two aspects of this problem.

1) Developing chemical recycling of composite materials reinforced with nanomaterials in a  part of a circular manufacturing process. 
2) Further developing our custom built Dielectric Analysis instrument to monitor polymerization reactions.  

The goal of these projects are to extend the existing methodology we have already demonstrated to allow us to work with nanoreinforced composites.

Transferable Skills: Research and presentations.

Duties and Responsibilities: Each project has its own timing (number of hours per week and number of weeks), as determined by the individual faculty mentor. See the CURI Digital Olaf database for individual project descriptions and details.

Qualifications: (Education/Experience/Skills) A student interested in applying for the CURI academic year program must be enrolled as an on-campus St. Olaf student. There is no GPA requirement that must be met in order to apply for the program, but a student’s academic record will be considered during the selection process. Skills are dependent on individual projects.

If you don’t have a work award and select, No, to the application questions your application will be automatically rejected by the system. If you apply and are rejected please contact Erin Eltonga to resolve this for you.

This job description is for general information purposes.  It is not intended to list all duties and responsibilities of the position.  This job description is subject to change at any time by St. Olaf College, with or without prior notice.