071— Geneseo COVID-19 Study Group V: Long-Term Pharmaceutical Strategies and Prevention of COVID-19

A vaccine is a form of weakened or killed virus that is inserted in the body in the method of an injection. Some vaccines, such as the COVID-19 vaccine, contain only a part of the virus. This stimulates the immune system to produce immunity to a specific disease instead of first experiencing the disease to build that protection. The COVID-19 vaccine is a messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccine that directs our cells how to make a specific protein (“spike protein”) to trigger an immune response inside our body, thus producing antibodies which protect us against COVID-19 particles. Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson are the authorized vaccines currently in distribution. Looking ahead, public health structures worldwide will continue to implement safety measures and track disease trends in order to protect the health of the human population. There are many steps being taken in the right direction with regards to vaccine distribution, testing, pharmaceuticals, treatment and policy. However, it will take the cooperation of all people to choose healthy behaviors such as masking, social distancing, and getting vaccinated, in order to achieve a state in which we may be safe to continue our lives as normal

Creating Quality Undergraduate Research Programs in Economics: How, When, Where (and Why)

While undergraduate research (UR) has been growing across the academy for decades, economics has been relatively slow to adopt it as pedagogy. We argue for the development of comprehensive UR programs that not only require capstone research experiences, but integrate foundational research skills throughout the curriculum. Fundamentally, there is a hierarchy whereby students learn basic research skills in lower-level courses, develop ability integrating content knowledge and research skills in upper-levels, and produce independent or collaborative research projects in later semesters. To facilitate such improvements, we make six recommendations for departments to consider when building or strengthening their UR environment. </jats:p