Are there other opportunities to promote student scholarship that would be a nice addition to the Students as Scholars QEP or to OSCAR after it is established?
Question B: Suggestions for Additional Opportunities
Sep 29th, 2010 by masonqep
Transforming Student Learning at Mason…
Sep 29th, 2010 by masonqep
Are there other opportunities to promote student scholarship that would be a nice addition to the Students as Scholars QEP or to OSCAR after it is established?
Mason could also expand beyond students’ own research projects to include students working on faculty research projects. At UCLA, I remember a database, which listed all the faculty interested in having undergraduates as research assistants. As I remember, the students didn’t get paid, but it was seen as quite an honor to work with a professor. I worked on a nuclear weapons policy project, which helped me to figure out what interested me and did not interest me about research and particular topics.
Johanna – we fully expect that in many cases students will be working with faculty members on faculty research projects. This is obviously beneficial to the faculty member since it moves their scholarship forward, but it can also make it possible for the student who does not have a particular scholarship project in mind to participate. One of the main items in the QEP is the development of a database of faculty interests and available projects that students can view, exactly as you suggested. We also hope we can open the database to community projects so that students will have access to additional opportunities.
Great! I’m glad to hear about these resources.
ICAR is launching a research portal on gender and conflict/volence. We have organized a “working group” of PhD and Masters students taking on various parts of the portal and would welcome undergraduates’ involvement on our subcommittees. Is this the kind of of project QEP would endorse?
Sandra- This sounds like a great opportunity for all of your students. If you need any help with models for involving undergraduates in this type of scaffolded project, just let me know. This is an excellent way to support undergraduate scholarship.
B. Opportunities for students to use funds to help work on Working Group research, as mentioned by Sandy Cheldelin above. Opportunities for students to display their scholarly creations in topically focused campus conferences so as to get cross-unit/school/college interactions and reduce marginalization of small units. Significant attention to incentives for faculty, especially junior faculty, involvement. The kind of faculty development needed to do some of this work well takes time and deserves recognition from administration at all levels, including in the promotion process.