TU Today

Provost’s URCI Fellows – Call for Applications

Are you a TU faculty member potentially interested in engaging in research during the summer with a small group of 1-5 students at the end of their freshman year at Towson? 

The summer program “Towson Inquiry Grants for Undergraduate Research in Summer” (TIGURS) will provide rising sophomores with housing, meal allowance, and a stipend to engage in authentic research experiences during a five-week period, from June 17 through July 19, 2024. Each student, or a small team of students, will be mentored by a faculty member. 

  Part of the vision of the program is to help develop teams of undergraduate research assistants who will be able to work with faculty mentors for several years after the summer program. 

  The faculty mentors will be formally recognized as Provost’s URCI Fellows and will receive monetary compensation. Faculty compensation will depend on team size and intensity of engagement and is expected to be around $1,000 per student with 1 to 5 students team involving daily, or near daily, personal interaction over five weeks. In addition to research time with faculty, the program will offer students skill-building workshops tailored to the projects. 

  If you are interested, please submit a paragraph-long description (linked here), intended for students, of your research interests. If you are interested, but have questions, please contact Dr. Seth Gitter or Dr. Alexei Kolesnikov at ourci@towson.edu. 

  At this stage, your interest does not mean a firm commitment. The plan is to put together a list of potentially interested faculty and research topics by the end of fall semester and advertise the program to freshmen over the winter break. A more sustained advertising effort at the beginning of the spring term will include information sessions for the students. 

  The students will be selected by the URCI and will be matched with faculty mentors by mid-March 2024, where faculty will have the opportunity to interview and approve matches. At that point a firm commitment to participate will be made by faculty and students. 

  We would appreciate having your responses by Friday, December 15. 

Categorised in: General

This post was written by Patterson, Richard E.