Value, Impact and Best Practices: Maximizing REU SBE Potential

本科生研究委员会(CUR)在华盛顿特区举办了一场为期1.5天的会议，专门讨论社会科学、行为学和经济学领域的本科生研究经验(REU)。这次会议汇集了REU资深获奖者及其学生、新获奖者和渴望为他们的机构赢得REU奖学金或将他们的学生送到REU项目的教职员工。与会者听取了全体演讲者关于这项研究的发言，该研究展示了本科生研究和本科生研究计划中的最佳实践的价值和影响。分组会议讨论了相关主题，例如如何制度化、维持和评估本科生研究项目，以及从一年级到四年级的本科生研究经验。至少有一个分组会议是专门为学生参与者设计的，例如利用本科生的研究经验来促进未来的职业成功。会议结束后，CUR将发布会议记录，包括全体会议发言、PowerPoint演示文稿和分组会议摘要。这些将提供给大学教职员工和管理人员的CUR网络。长期存在的REU项目制定了招收和监督学生、提供后勤支持、监督研究、教授研究伦理和传播研究成果的程序。目前还没有机制让这些经验丰富的方案与现有方案或新获奖者分享其最佳做法；本次会议提供了这一机制。会议包括SBE REU项目的学生参与者，以(A)与主要研究人员和NSF项目官员分享他们的经验，以及(B)与他们在SBE科学的广泛学科领域的其他教职员工和学生体验一次学术会议。REU项目通常由了解各自学科研究的研究人员开发和管理，但可能不知道本科生研究的奖学金。这次会议通过分享关于参与研究的影响的研究，帮助经验丰富的REU主要研究人员将他们的本科生研究计划纳入到更广泛的框架中。它还帮助新的主要研究人员考虑并可能采用在资深项目中制定的适当的最佳实践来进行他们自己的项目。它帮助其机构目前没有主办REU项目的教职员工了解他们的学生如何获得其他机构的REU项目，以及他们自己如何获得REU资助。会议还讨论了所有人都感兴趣的问题，例如，将REU项目制度化，SBE REU网站面临的具体挑战，获得额外资源，以及将适当的研究机会纳入本科课程。

The Council on Undergraduate Research (CUR) is hosting a 1.5 day conference in Washington, DC, devoted to Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) in the fields of Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences. The conference brings together veteran REU awardees and their students, new awardees, and faculty who aspire to win REU grants for their institutions or send their students to REU programs. Participants hear from plenary speakers on the research showing the value and impact of undergraduate research and best practices in undergraduate research programs. Breakout sessions address relevant topics, e.g. how to institutionalize, sustain, and evaluate undergraduate research programs, and scaffolding undergraduate research experiences from first through fourth year. At least one breakout session is designed specifically for student participants, e.g. leveraging undergraduate research experiences for future career success. Following the conference, CUR will publish conference proceedings with plenary addresses, PowerPoint presentations, and summaries of breakout sessions. These will be made available to the CUR network of university faculty and administrators.Intellectual merit. Long-standing REU programs have developed procedures for recruiting and supervising students, providing logistical support, supervising research, teaching research ethics, and disseminating research results. There is currently no mechanism for these experienced programs to share their best practices with existing programs or with new awardees; this conference provides that mechanism. The conference includes student participants in SBE REU programs to (a) share their experiences with principal investigators and NSF program officers and (b) experience an academic conference with other faculty and students in their broad disciplinary area within the SBE sciences.Broader impacts. REU programs are typically developed and managed by researchers who understand research in their own disciplines, but may not know of the scholarship of undergraduate research. This conference helps experienced REU principal investigators put their undergraduate research programs into a broader framework by sharing research on the impact of participating in research. It also helps new principal investigators consider and potentially adopt the appropriate best practices developed in veteran program to their own projects. It helps faculty whose institutions do not currently host an REU program to learn how their students can access REU programs at other institutions, and how they might win REU grants themselves. The conference also addresses issues of interest to all, e.g. institutionalizing REU programs, specific challenges faced by SBE REU sites, securing additional resources, and incorporating appropriate research opportunities into undergraduate curricula.