Longwood University is working toward establishing undergraduate research projects that benefit both undergraduate students and their faculty mentors.
The development of this program, which is part of Longwood’s Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP) to advance undergraduate research and academic inquiry, continues nearly a year after the selection of the QEP topic.
Longwood works to receive both accreditation and reaffirmation from the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACS) every 10 years, and the development of the QEP is part of this process. Dr. McRae Amoss, professor of French, is also the QEP director.
SACS accreditation and reaffirmation aids students in acquiring federally subsidized financial aid and allows university courses to be regionally and internationally recognized.
Dr. Paul Miller, director of Elon University’s Undergraduate Research Program, brought his expertise to the university with a March 20 presentation on undergraduate research programs.
Dr. Heather Lettner-Rust, member of the QEP Working Group and assistant professor of English, met Miller at a conference in October and helped bring him to the university as a QEP consultant.
“[Elon University has] an office devoted to working with faculty and students, as we’re working toward,” Lettner-Rust said.
Lettner-Rust said a central reason why the QEP Working Group selected Miller as a consultant was “the relative parody of our institution with his.” Elon, while a private university, is also a liberal arts institution. The university features an undergraduate population of about 5,300 in comparison to Longwood’s approximate 4,800 undergraduate students.
According to Miller, Elon University launched the Undergraduate Research Program in 1992. The program began within scientific disciplines but eventually expanded to every department on campus.
“I think every faculty member on campus, every student on campus, has the opportunity to benefit from this high-impact pedagogue,” Miller said.
A signature component within the program is the Summer Undergraduate Research Experience (SURE), an extensive, eight week-long program that allows faculty to work as research mentors for undergraduate students. Both faculty and students receive stipends for their work.
Miller highlighted three important concepts concerning faculty involvement with undergraduate research: service, scholarship and teaching, which he said are “essential to our evaluation system as well as our promotion and tenure system.”
Regarding service, Miller said it is important for “people to be not only willing to serve as mentors but also be willing to serve as the key constituents in forming the direction of the program.” He added that it is essential for faculty and the undergraduate research office to communicate regularly.
Scholarship, according to Miller, means actions such as reviewing applications for funding, setting up research days and summer programs and reviewing programs.
As far as the role of teaching in the undergraduate research process, Miller said, “A lot of one-on- one time spent with a student on an unanswered question is an awesome teaching opportunity.”
According to Miller, there are a great deal of benefits for students who participate in undergraduate research, such as enhanced academic performance and productivity, skill development, networking opportunities, initial employment, professional confidence and identity, higher income level and career eminence.
“Anecdotally, I can tell you that the students we’ve worked with in undergraduate research at Elon matriculate to better graduate programs,” Miller said.
Miller cited benefits for faculty mentors such as personal satisfaction, fulfillment with their job when they are working with students in research, enhanced creative energy, professional rejuvenation and a motivation to remain current.
Faculty participation in undergraduate research, in Miller’s experience, motivates faculty “to keep pushing the ball down the field, so to speak, especially when those efforts are aligned with their career and research interests.”
Miller believes universities should invest in undergraduate research because “production across the faculty increases when a good undergraduate research program is instituted.” He said there is enhanced educational commitment, increased faculty retention and additional talent development within universities when these types of programs are established.
“We’re able to take young people, early career people, who are probably at the cutting edge of their discipline coming out of graduate programs and being able to develop their talent in other areas,” Miller added.
Miller said financial support for Elon’s Undergraduate Research Program, such as ongoing grant and aid programs and endowed gifts to student learning and research help the program thrive.
Each year at Elon, $30,000 is allocated to research- related travel and $20,000 is given toward grant and aid. There is separate funding for the National Conference on Undergraduate Research (NCUR), which Elon’s Undergraduate Research Program sends 40-50 students to annually.
A successful undergraduate research program, Miller said, is of high quality, easily accessible, effectively marketed adjusted to fit the respective institution’s culture.
Miller said it is essential for students participating in undergraduate to reach out to younger students in order to get them interested.
“When you have a student who’s coming up behind you who you know, who’s a good student, an engaged student, talk to them about why that has fed your passions, get them excited about it, invite them to be part of it,” Miller said.
Shelby Waugh, a student representative within the QEP Working Group, thought Miller’s presentation was helpful in providing her with ideas to set up a university research day.
“Since we are having a summer research program ... it’d be really cool if we set up a fall research day and had all the people from summer do it,” Waugh said.
Waugh said this is most likely a long-term goal because she is not sure if the funds for a fall research day are currently available. Lettner-Rust thought it was interesting that undergraduate research is “largely done through individual mentoring relationships with professor and student, and I think that’s kind of a signature of Longwood.”
Ultimately, said Lettner-Rust, “I think that our real growth area may be helping individual professors mentor students and not, so to speak, start other classes or start whole new programs.”
