STRC Undergraduate Research Fellowship

The STRC Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) is open to students by nomination. Students interested in the fellowship should contact a faculty member who has familiarity with your research and writing skills to discuss the opportunity and seek a nomination.

About the Fellowship Program

The STRC Undergraduate Fellowship will provide six undergraduate students with a $5,000 stipend and free tuition to attend a 5-week Summer Session I course, co-taught by two LAS faculty, which will introduce them to basic research methodologies in the interdisciplinary humanities.

The course, entitled “Research Methods in the Interdisciplinary Humanities,” is an on-campus, 5-week, 4 credit-hour seminar in interdisciplinary humanities research methods. During the class, students will:

• develop a viable research question on a topic of their choice related to some aspect of the histories and cultures of people of color, in the US or in diaspora;
• build a bibliography of secondary and primary sources;
• develop a plan of work;
• write an abstract;
• draft a 3-5 page prospectus for a 10-12 page research paper.

Students will spend the rest of their summer independently researching and drafting their research paper according to their prospectuses. They will meet once with their assigned faculty mentor (one of the instructors of the summer course) in late July/early August to report on their progress; they will submit rough drafts of their papers on/around August 30. After receiving feedback on their drafts in early September, they will work with their faculty mentor to develop a poster presentation about their research project for the STRC Symposium in late October. They will continue to revise the paper through fall quarter and submit a final version to their faculty mentor for a grade in early December.

Questions may also be directed to the STRC at strc@depaul.edu.