The Office of Undergraduate Research anticipates awarding fellowships to students interested in pursuing their research or creative activity efforts. The fellowships will be distributed among the three schools (Business, HSS, & SET) based upon the number of proposals received from each school. Proposals from all academic disciplines are welcome and strongly encouraged.

The fellowships provide funds for undergraduate students to participate with faculty mentors in an eight-week intensive scholarly activity. Each fellowship will provide a $2500 student stipend and a $1000 faculty stipend.  An additional $500 may be requested to purchase supplies and/or to support the student’s project.  The student stipends will be paid in three installments.  The first installment ($1000) will be made on June 1st, 2009, contingent upon attendance to an introductory meeting for students and faculty mentors.  The second installment ($1000) will be made after the completion of an interim report and attendance at a gathering on June 26th, 2009.  The final installment ($500) of the student stipend as well as the faculty stipend will be paid after the submission of a final report and survey (deadline: August 14th, 2009).

Eligibility Requirements

1. Only one proposal per faculty mentor will be accepted.
2. Students must be a sophomore, junior, or senior (graduating in May 2010).
3. Faculty must be available on-campus during the duration of the program (June 1st – July 24th, 2009).
4. Awards are contingent upon IRB approval for use of human subjects and/or IACUC approval for use of vertebrate animals in proposed research projects. MANDATORY meetings to discuss the IRB/IACUC approval process are scheduled for December 3rd, 2008, and for January 21st, 2009, from 2-3 p.m. in MATH 105.   Failure to attend ONE of these meetings will result in your application being withdrawn from consideration.

Expectations

1. Mandatory attendance at an orientation meeting on June 1st, 2009 at which time each fellowship recipient will give a brief presentation (~10 minutes) describing their proposed scholarly activity.
2. Completion of an interim report during the program on June 26th, 2009.  The second installment of the student stipend will be made available after this report is submitted and approved.
3. Completion of a final report (approximately 2-3 pages including a digital picture of the student) by August 14th, 2009.  Guidelines for this final report will be provided to students and faculty mentors during the orientation meeting in June.  Additional work (e.g., manuscripts) may be expected from your mentor.
4. Mandatory participation in the 11th Annual Undergraduate Research Symposium and Creative Activities Exhibition (March-April, 2010) and in the Jose Miguel Cimadevilla Memorial Seminar series.

Evaluation Criteria

Please use the fillable PDF application form listed in the menu to the left to submit your fellowship application.  The following criteria will be used by internal reviewers (St.MU faculty) to evaluate your proposal based on a 100-point scoring system.  The numbers in the parantheses represent the maximum points attainable for that particular section.

1. Research Project/Creative Activity Criteria
   1. clarity of project/creative activity description including goals and anticipated outcomes (20 points)
   2. appropriateness of the approach and/or methods utilized to achieve goals (10 points)
   3. likelihood of achieving a successful outcome (e.g., manuscript, presentation, etc.) and/or the possibility of acquiring additional funding from project/activity outcomes (10 points)
2. Student Criteria
   1. overall academic performance (provide copy of official transcript) (10 points)
   2. student preparation (relevant academic and/or extracurricular experience and achievements) (10 points)
   3. two recommendation letters (one from faculty mentor & one from another faculty familiar with student (10 points)
3. Faculty Criteria
   1. mentoring plan (20 points)
   2. professional accomplishments including any previous mentoring of undergraduates (10 points)