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AMES, Iowa – The eighth annual Stupka Symposium at Iowa State University is Thursday, April 11. The event is organized and run by students in the Roy J. Carver Department of Biochemistry, Biophysics and Molecular Biology.

The daylong symposium is dedicated to promote student-professor interactions and facilitate opportunities for students to learn how to thrive in the academic and professional communities. Held at the Molecular Biology Building, the symposium will begin at 9 a.m. and continue throughout the day featuring numerous presentations.

Raeann Shimak, senior in biochemistry, is the publicity chair for the symposium and has been involved with the event since she was a freshman at Iowa State. “Being involved with the symposium has really opened my eyes to see how much work goes into the event,” she said. Other committees focused on fund raising, operations, organizing guest speakers and arranging volunteers.

Shimak finds that talking to professors at the symposium is helpful for planning her career path. “To see the processes they went through to get where they are today is enlightening,” she said.

The event is named in honor of former ISU biochemistry undergraduate Robert John Stupka III, who died in fall 2005.

The keynote speakers are Clive Svendsen, of Cedars-Sinai Institutes in California, and Mike Summers, University of Maryland. The event also includes student speakers and a research poster session. See more information at www.bbmb.iastate.edu/news-events/2013-stupka-symposium/.

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