Undergraduate Research

Oberlin Lab Crawl

Discover research at Oberlin.

 

The Oberlin College Lab Crawl is an annual open house that provides a fun and informal interaction with different research labs and opportunities around campus. The purpose of the lab crawl is to encourage students to seek out research on campus whether that be in labs, through honors, coursework, and/or volunteering. Lab Crawl gives students the opportunity to interact with research and opportunities on campus, through actual lab experiments, archive research, art practices, and everything in between.

 

Join us on October 30, 2026 from 12-1:30pm. 

 

Lab Crawl 2025

Last Halloween, over 600 Obies participated in Lab Crawl 2025 as either a participant or a volunteer. Participants visited 68 stations located across campus to learn about research and resources that can be found on Oberlin's campus, collecting stickers, trick-or-treat collectables, and prizes along the way. Interested students can use this unique open-house opportunity to see inside the labs and research spaces of Oberlin and learn from faculty and current students involved in various research projects. Hope to see you at Lab Crawl 2026!

Students participating in Lab Crawl 2024
Photo credit: Amanda Phillips

The 2025 Crawls to complete for prizes:

  • The Mini Crawl: visit 6 stations - Grab some pizza!
  • The Minor Crawl: visit 8 stations - Get a special edition sticker (1 per building visited)
  • The Major Crawl: visit 12 stations across 3 different buildings - Get a special edition t-shirt OR tote (your choice!)
  • The Exploratory Crawl: visit 16 stations across any of the buildings - Earn a raffle entry for a fun prize bundle!

*Pizza and prizes will be located in the Science Center and the Art Museum

Buildings with Lab Crawl stations include Science Center, Mudd, AJLC, Wright, Severance, Carnegie, Bosworth, and the Allen Memorial Art Museum.

Each building will have different disciplines represented; for example in 2025:

  • Allen Memorial Art Museum: Arts, Music, and Humanities
  • AJLC: Environmental Studies
  • Bosworth Hall: Data Science
  • Carnegie: Geosciences
  • King: Sociology, Anthropology
  • Mudd: Libraries, Media, Resources; costume contest photo location
  • Science Center: (Bio)Chemistry, Biology, Neuroscience, Computer Science
  • Severance: Psychology
  • Wright: Physics