Program makes student project ideas a reality
This year, 50-60 Utah State undergraduate students will receive grant money to aid them in their research through the Undergraduate Research and Creative Opportunities (URCO) program.
Joyce Kinkead, associate vice president for research, said “URCO grants are designed to give students a chance to do independent research on a project of their own design.”
Kinkead said the types of research students do can be very broadly defined.
“Research can be creating a sculpture, composing a piece of music, doing archival scholarly work and working at the laboratory bench.”
The URCO Grant program was created in 1975. Since then, more than 500 USU students have conducted research using money received from writing grant proposals.
“Each URCO experience helps students learn how to learn, develop critical skills, create important one-on-one connections with professors and get an academic step ahead of the competition,” Kinkead said.
URCO grants are given by Kinkead’s office. They will award up to $500, and the student’s academic department will match the award.
By providing financial support to undergraduates for research or creative projects that are not routine requirements for a course or degree program, URCO grants encourage students to engage in independent projects, she said.
Students who are applying for the grants must submit an official research proposal. This teaches them the proper way and process of finding funding, Kinkead said. That is a crucial part of doing graduate-level research.
According the URCO website, all grant applications must begin with an abstract.
“An abstract provides the reader with a quick overview of the proposal and helps them understand the point immediately,” the URCO website states.
Students must then explain their project and justify their need for money from the university. They need to inform the faculty judges what they would use the money for.
“URCO grants provide funds for materials and supplies. If travel is needed to conduct the research, that is a legitimate cost as well,” Kinkead said.
A detailed budget must be written out, starting with the total amount of money they are requesting from the URCO committee.
In their applications, students need to describe their goals, and the outcome they hope to see at the end of the research.
In 2008, an article was published that talked about the history of the URCO program.
USU was ahead of its time in implementing URCO grants. Very few institutions had organized student-faculty cooperative research activities such as this. That spring, USU launched an URCO experiment with 60 student participants through the College of Agriculture and the College of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences. There was such a positive response, that a plan was made to launch URCO on a university-wide basis.
Any undergraduate student in good academic standing may apply for a grant. After all the applications have been turned in, a faculty panel reviews the proposals and selects the recipients.
“We fund as many of the grants as possible, and it’s really only if a grant is not truly about research or is badly written that it doesn’t succeed,” Kinkead said. “Some grants are returned for revision and resubmission. This is part of the learning process on how grants are written and submitted.”
Many URCO alumni say these grants, and the experience of writing the proposals, led to many opportunities in their education.
Jessica Feigleson graduated from USU last May and is currently living in Taiwan.
“Because of URCO I was able to perform an in-depth study in an area of interest to me. I was able to get a hands-on experience with research and oversee all facets of the research process,” she said. “By learning how to conduct my own research and by becoming familiar with the funding process, I have learned how all the pieces of my classroom experiences could come together to help me answer questions using the research process.”
The deadline to apply for URCO grants to be used during spring semester of 2011 has passed, but the opportunity will be available again for next fall semester. Those applications must be turned in by Feb. 15. Application information can be found online or in Kinkead’s office.
“As a land-grant and research university, USU takes pride in the fact that students learn science by doing science, learn art by producing art and learn scholarship by writing history,” Kinkead said. “Hands-on inquiry and study builds on classroom knowledge and goes beyond what can be accomplished through lecture. The application of knowledge is a hallmark of a land-grant university. URCO is a critical component of that mission.”
– megan.allen@aggiemail.usu.edu