By Annette Finley-Croswhite
The Office of Academic Affairs is once again offering funding to develop Course-based Undergraduate Research (CURE) opportunities in ¹ÏÉñÍø colleges.
The CURE program aims to generate active learning in the classroom by embedding the research process into course curricula. Studies indicate that students who engage in undergraduate research develop higher-level critical thinking skills and discover new knowledge.
Course-based undergraduate research has been traditionally associated with lab sciences and controlled experiments. Expanding on this model, many of our scientists at ¹ÏÉñÍø have designed their courses to create semi-controlled experiments or exercises where discovery is novel and answers are not known in advance.
Course-based undergraduate research should not be confined to science classrooms, however. All faculty members are able to consider the research methodologies in their disciplines and inject the discovery process more strongly into course curricula. You can read about the 2022 CURE winners from marketing and women’s & gender studies here.
Many people think of undergraduate research as a model in which a faculty mentor guides one student or a few students in a single project. The grant funding in this case is for course design in which an entire class of students are exposed to disciplinary research methods and engage in discovery as part of the curriculum.
The 2023 CURE request for proposals will go out to all faculty in August 2023. Proposals are due by November 17, 2023, to the Center for Faculty Development at cdf@odu.edu. Find out more about proposal preparation here. Awards must be spent by June 15, 2024, and the new course must be taught in the 2024-2025 academic year.
The Provost's Office will make funds available up to $2,000 per awardee; applicants are encouraged to look for matching funds.
For both faculty and students, the lessons learned using undergraduate research offer unique opportunities for transformative education. If you are ¹ÏÉñÍø full-time teaching and research faculty, tenured, tenure-track or non-tenure track, please consider applying for the 2024 CURE grant.