The 12th Annual SOARS Conference was held at North Carolina Central University on November 8th, 2002. The theme for this year's conference which is sponsored by the North Carolina Consortium for Undergraduate Research was "Shaping the Future Through Discovery".

Participants from Elizabeth City State University included:

In addition to poster presentations, several students also delivered oral presentations. A luncheon was also held during which the keynote speaker, Rick Martinez, M.D. delivered an address.

"The Keynote Speaker for the luncheon ceremony was Dr. Rick Martinez who is presently serving as the Director of Medical Affairs, Johnson & Johnson, Corporate Contributions and Community Relations, in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Dr. Martinez's talk was centered on "Ideas Matter". He said that we are being trained in Undergraduate to make judgements in our field, to think critically, to use our mind, and apply every aspect of it in research. He went on to say that we are critical to the future and should put into practice the notion of thinking for ourselves."

Ramatoulie Bah, ECSU Research Student