As Nebraska’s Undergraduate Creative Activities and Research Experience program celebrates the end of its summer session with a virtual showcase of projects, and we settle into a new academic year, it is an ideal moment to encourage students to take a look at undergraduate research opportunities.
In addition to the research programs available through UCARE, UNL will participate for the first time in the International Conference of Undergraduate Research at the end of September. Six students will have work showcased and registration is free for faculty, staff, and students who would like to watch their presentations.
Undergraduate research helps connect students with the world beyond their university, their state, and even their country. It provides an opportunity for them to escape their disciplinary boundaries and focus on problems the solutions to which cannot be found within single subjects. It's also great way to support the university’s strategic objective of co-creating knowledge.
In Undergraduate research, learning gain and equity: the impact of final year research projects for Higher Education Pedagogies, Jonathan Parker shares that undergraduate research:
- increases rates of student retention and engagement
- results in improvement in students’ knowledge, skills, and personal development over time
- promotes intellectual skills like problem-solving and analysis, improved personal initiative and communication, higher tolerance for ambiguity and obstacles in problem-solving, ethical conduct
- integrates theory and practice, develops higher-level writing skills, and increases critical-thinking and communication skills
- allows for beneficial collaboration with student peers and faculty
Instructors who are interested in becoming an undergraduate research mentor should contact Justina Clark at ucare@unl.edu.
More details at: https://ucare.unl.edu