Research Guides: High-Impact Educational Practices: Undergraduate Research

Undergraduate Research

Many colleges and universities are now providing research experiences for students in all disciplines. Undergraduate research, however, has been most prominently used in science disciplines. With strong support from the National Science Foundation and the research community, scientists are reshaping their courses to connect key concepts and questions with students’ early and active involvement in systematic investigation and research. The goal is to involve students with actively contested questions, empirical observation, cutting-edge technologies, and the sense of excitement that comes from working to answer important questions.

Reflecting on Reflecting: Summer Undergraduate Research Students' Experiences in Developing Electronic Portfolios, a Meta-High Impact Practice
This pilot study assessed how using electronic portfolios (ePortfolios) as a meta-high impact practice (meta-HIP) might influence student learning through reflective practice. Eleven undergraduates participating in a summer research program reflected weekly on their research experiences through building and using ePortfolios, and attended three focus groups. The researchers assessed the students' level of engagement as a result of their weekly posts and studied how they used ePortfolios to enhance their learning. Results suggest that the students utilized their ePortfolios to communicate their enjoyment for their research projects as well as their increased knowledge and skills; make their learning more visible; track their achievements, which resulted in enhanced motivation; and demonstrate their pride in intellectual and personal growth. The students also appreciated the feedback they received on their reflections. As drawbacks, the participants believed that building an ePortfolio could be challenging in regards to designing the aesthetics, developing the appropriate content, securing the time for development, and using the website for the long-term. Consequently, the researchers found that a student learning community formed as a result of using ePortfolios as a meta-HIP. Nevertheless, for ePortfolio implementation to be successful, challenges pertaining to faculty adoption, resources, training, and scaling need to be addressed.

Evaluating the Undergraduate Research Experience by Gabriel M. Della-Piana; Connie Kubo Della-Piana; Michael K. Gardner
ISBN: 1623965411
Publication Date: 2013-12-01
The current movement toward more and better research experiences for undergraduates has spread across disciplines in the arts, humanities, science, mathematics, and engineering beyond the "research university" to the full range of post-secondary institutions of higher education. Along with this spread of practice is the need to take stock of the programs and make use of evaluation to inform program improvement and to communicate an understanding of the worth of the program to funders, institutional administrators, faculty/mentors, and students. The main aim of the book is to provide a practical guide for planning an evaluation of an undergraduate experience program. The intent is to enable a program director to plan with a team consisting of an internal evaluator and program staff, a systematic and rigorous study of the program (processes, products, organizational dynamics, etc.) including the gathering and analysis of information that is context-sensitive, and connected to an argument and justification for descriptive, causal, and practice-useful claims. It is useful for a program director to contract with an evaluator. It is specific to the field of undergraduate research experience while being useful for other fields. It places strong emphasis on how to find and specify evaluation questions that yield information that has high leverage for program improvement and demonstrating the effectiveness and worth of the program. A measure of attitude toward evaluation allows you to reflect on your leanings evaluation orientations such as formative/summative, process/product, preordinate goals/emergent goals, and other characteristics of approaches to and confidence in evaluation. The main readership is targeted to directors and developers of undergraduate research experience programs. While the examples are mainly in the undergraduate research experience, it will be found useful for instructors of courses in project evaluation and beginning level evaluators. The usefulness of the book is enhanced by a checklist in the final chapter that integrates the approaches from throughout the book referencing the earlier discussions.

Benefits of Undergraduate Research Experiences
Undergraduate students'participation in hands-on research is widely believed to encourage students to pursue advanced degrees and careers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics fields. SRI International conducted a nationwide evaluation of undergraduate research opportunities (UROs) to understand who participates, what effects the experience has on them, and what factors favor positive outcomes. Our study included four Web-based surveys, conducted between 2003 and 2005 and involving almost 15,000 respondents. The survey instruments, detailed data tables, and analytical reports are available online (1).

Respondents to the first survey were approximately 4500 undergraduates and 3600 faculty, graduate student, and postdoc mentors who participated during 2002 or 2003 in UROs funded by any of eight NSF programs with a substantial undergraduate research component. Two years later, about 3300 individuals who were undergraduates in the initial survey responded to the follow-up survey.

In 2003, we surveyed a nationally representative sample of individuals (ages 22 to 35) who had received a bachelor's degree in science, technology, engineering, or mathematics (STEM) (n = 3400); in 2004, we conducted a parallel survey of individuals who had received a bachelor's degree in a social, behavioral, or economic science (SBES) (n = 3200). Of the STEM and SBES survey respondents, some (sponsored researchers) knew their research to be sponsored by NSF, NIH, or NASA. Others (nonsponsored researchers) did research that was not (as far as they knew) sponsored by NSF, NIH, or NASA. A third group (nonresearchers) did not participate in UROs.

The SOURCE-Syracuse Office of Undergraduate Research & Creative Engagement
To foster and support diverse undergraduate participation in faculty-guided scholarly research and creative inquiry. Student participants will progress through initial training in research or other creative skills, to designing and revising the structure of their projects, and culminating in research, creative, and professional contributions that are original and timely.