Help & Guidelines

CIMR Symposium Workshops

    The Center for Internship, Mentoring, and Research (CIMR) is hosting a series of in-person and virtual workshops to help students prepare for SRS. All workshop attendees will be entered for a cash raffle prize! Can’t make it? Workshops will be recorded, and any workshop material will be shared with anyone who completes the RSVP form as well as on this page. RSVP to join a CIMR Symposium Workshop
  • Abstract Writing Workshop - Friday, February 9, 3:00pm-4:30pm (view workshop materials below)
  • Scientific Poster Help Session - Friday, April 12, 3:00pm-4:30pm
  • Scientific Oral Presentation Help Session - Friday, April 19, 3:00pm-4:30pm
  • Presentation Coaching Session - Monday, May 6, 3:00pm-4:30pm
  • Developing an Abstract

    Those who evaluate your proposal will likely be unfamiliar with your discipline. Although it is not required that you include all the items listed here, a strong research abstract often includes these elements:

    Here are the steps and materials needed to submit your proposal/abstract:

    1. Navigate to the Submit Presentation/Poster page
    2. Read and accept the Submission Agreement.
    3. Choose to present either a poster or an oral presentation. Ideally, when your final work is completed, you will submit your paper or poster files to PDXScholar. This might be the PDF of your poster, slides, pre-recorded video, and/or transcript.
    4. Your first and last name and the names of any co-authors.
    5. Your email address - (please share an account that you check daily as we will use it for future communications about the event).
    6. Your class level and the school department or unit under which you study.
    7. Your adviser's name and email address or your project's faculty mentor, if you have one.
    8. Your paper or poster title.
    9. A 150-200 word abstract outlining your research.
    10. After your abstract/proposal is accepted and your paper (oral presentation) or poster is ready to share, you will log in here again and upload the PDF of your poster, slides, optional pre-recorded video, and/or transcript. Check the Additional Files box to include any supplemental files in addition to your main file.

    Tools for Creating Effective Posters

    Each student will:

    • Highlight the main research finding by stating it succinctly and in plain English accessible to a broad audience
    • Emphasize this main finding statement (or “punchline”) with a larger font size and placement toward the top and center of the poster
    • Limit poster size to no more than 36" x 48" (90cm x 121cm); landscape or portrait orientation is acceptable
    • Choose a white background, limiting photos and colored backgrounds to the center portion of the poster
    • Align text left if more than two lines long
    • Ensure posters are accessible. PowerPoint resources:
    • Optional: Students are welcome to include an MP4 video explaining their posters. See below for more information.

    Poster Content Suggestions

    Your poster should present high-level answers to the following questions:
    • What did you find? Focus on your primary research finding.
    • Why is it significant? Emphasize any exciting potential applications or uses, as well as any surprising discoveries. How might your research change the way people live?
    • What did you do, and how did you do it? Describe your hypothesis and your methods.
    • What comes next? Would you like to repeat an experiment on a larger scale or with a larger sample? How does your work inform the current thinking in your field? Did your findings raise new questions worth exploring?

    Poster Printing & Scholarships

    Scholarships to pay for poster printing will be available to all students presenting a poster at SRS. For more information, visit the Poster Competition & Printing page.

    Oral Presentations

    General Recommendations for Oral Presentations
    • Oral presentations must not exceed 5 minutes.
    • After your presentation, you will have 5 minutes to answer questions from the audience.
    • Time your presentation and practice it in advance.
    • Do not plan to read your paper or sections of your paper.
    • In your presentation, summarize your research by highlighting your research questions, methods, findings, and conclusions.
    • If you decide to post a video recording of your presentation on PDXScholar, each oral presentation will need to be closed captioned or include a written transcript. If you have a written transcript, please submit it with your video.
    Oral Presentation Help

    Spend time viewing these short oral presentation tutorials.

    Optional: Creating Videos

    For those who would like to prerecord their presentation to upload to PDXScholar, we recommend using Zoom. These are the basic steps:

    • Login into Zoom using your PSU email address.
    • Click Host or Schedule meeting.
    • Navigate to your presentation or poster.
    • Click Share Screen.
    • Click Record to the Cloud.
    • When finished, end the recording and wait for it to be available.
    • In the main Zoom menu, find your file under Recordings.
    • Click download.

    Watch the video in the Example Submission: How to Record and Download Your Presentation Using Zoom

    The Maximum Length for Videos is 5 Minutes

    Optional: Feedback Form

    If you would like to invite feedback and questions from those who see your research with the PDXScholar portal you can include a feedback form with your submission. Use this Feedback Form Template. Copy the template, and rename it with your last name. Change questions as you like, or keep it the same. Include a link to your personalized Feedback Form at the end of your abstract. This will allow you to privately receive feedback and questions from conference participants and viewers. Here is an example of how it will look in your submission: Example Submission

    Questions? Email us at cimr@pdx.edu.