During the 2010-2011 school year, Mississippi State University and the Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science are continuing their partnership in research programs for select high school juniors and seniors.
The residential and co-educational public high school sends students from the campus in Columbus to the MSU campus about twice a week to complete study and research hours. MSMS students are assigned to mentors who instruct them in the techniques of research in their prospective field. These students are able to work in any research program MSU offers.
This program is not the first partnership between these two schools. Jennifer Sloan, civil engineering graduate student, went to MSMS her junior and senior year of high school and participated in a similar research program called QUEST during the summer after her junior year.
“I was able to continue my work as a researcher when I came to Mississippi State,” said Sloan, regarding the benefits of her pre-college work.
Jamarius Waller, a senior at MSMS, said he is benefitting from this hands-on research experience even as a high school student.
He said he is getting a taste of what a given field is like and getting a chance to investigate what he may want to study in the future. Waller said one program available is the research by MSU faculty and MSMS students on skin cancer.
“I think that it is an amazing experience for any high school student,” Waller said.
The program involves about 40 students at MSMS. This semester only seniors are involved, but in the spring semester several juniors will be joining them. 
There is a minimum research requirement of four hours a week for students involved in the program, but most students usually complete that in one day of work on the MSU campus. Tuesdays and Thursdays are the days MSMS students usually come to MSU to work.
Emerald Barrett, an MSMS graduate and a MSU freshman animal and dairy science major, said during her senior year at MSMS she had the opportunity to learn the clinical aspects of her field and sample a career as a practicing veterinarian.
“The program was really helpful because I got to see what a [veterinarian] would get to do with their degree,” Barrett said.
She completed a program on equine wound healing under the leadership of Dr. Cyprianna Swiderski, assistant professor in the College of Veterinary Medicine’s Clinical Science Department.
Barrett chose to do the program during her senior year but had the opportunity to participate during the second semester of her junior year at MSMS if she had chosen to.
After the first several weeks, Barrett said the student is basically a research assistant, given the workload and type of tasks the student has each day. Students are expected to rise to that level and meet the challenges they face.
“When you come in each day, you already know what to do and you know what the researchers are expecting,” said Barrett.
Several students out of Barrett’s class at MSMS were able to present their research at a national science fair.
Another student completed research in biology and presented their findings to a medical forum, Barrett said.
MSMS juniors involved in the program present their research to their high school faculty at the end of the spring semester. Seniors at MSMS participate in a formal presentation at the end of the year at MSU where they present their research to some of the MSU department heads.
MSMS offers a rigorous curriculum of study to high school juniors and seniors who may not feel pushed or challenged at their current high schools. 
“I would say [MSMS] has the best curriculum of any high school in Mississippi,” Waller said.