Since 2008, Study USA has enabled students to live, learn, and gain professional experience in dynamic cities nationwide. Its internship pathway, which helps students build career skills, explore professional interests and develop valuable networks, will remain a central part of the program.

The new pathway will allow students to pursue faculty-mentored research while experiencing life in a new city. Beginning this summer, students conducting research in New York City, Washington, D.C., or Los Angeles may apply through Study USA. Accepted students will complete the undergraduate research approval process and work with a faculty mentor during the spring semester to develop a research plan.

“The Undergraduate Research Program is thrilled to pursue this new collaboration with Study USA,” said Justin Clar, director of the Undergraduate Research Program. “The opportunity for students to engage in a high-impact practice in the real world can be transformative.”

This preparation will help students connect with professionals, organizations and resources in their host city. By combining Study USA’s immersive, place-based learning with faculty-mentored research, students can deepen their academic work while expanding their professional and personal networks.

“Study USA’s new undergraduate research pathway reflects �鶹��Ƶ’s commitment to diverse experiential learning opportunities,” said Nick Gozik, dean of global education. “By combining place-based learning with faculty-mentored research, students can make the most of what �鶹��Ƶ offers while engaging more deeply with their academic and professional interests.”

by the , a UK-based group that advocates for research, policy, and practice initiatives to support belonging across all learning environments. Sharing his research with an international audience means that Jackson is able to impact teaching practice on a broader scale.

Laing describes the process as a rewarding experience: “As an education major, I want to become the best teacher I can be. Having a chance to dive into hands-on classroom observations, conduct interviews, and experience different teaching styles, has given me tools that I can use in my future classrooms. Beyond that, coming up with a list of specific things that teachers can do in their classroom to help the students adjust, belong, and feel comfortable has been really rewarding, and I hope that my research can help other teachers as well.”

Laing’s findings are published in the Practice arm of the Centre for Belonging in Education which emphasizes his goal to connect his research to classroom experiences and, ultimately, to improve student learning. Importantly, his findings will also impact his experience as a teacher.

“I am taking away a newfound respect for doing the little things in a classroom,” Laing said. “A lot of my findings weren’t giant acts or moves to entirely change a classroom, but simple, day-to-day things to help build a strong culture and community. In the end, I really appreciate these little things, and plan on doing them consistently in my classrooms.”

This research project was mentored by Evan Small, who also serves as a Founding Fellow for the Centre for Belonging in Education.

In the latest U.S. News and World Report “Best Colleges” guide, �鶹��Ƶ was ranked No. 100 among national universities and, among private universities, �鶹��Ƶ is ranked No. 55. The National Universities category includes institutions across the country with a broad range of undergraduate majors as well as master’s and doctoral programs, with many also producing significant academic research.

�鶹��Ƶ joined the National Universities category in 2019 and has steadily strengthened its position while maintaining national leadership in undergraduate teaching and high-impact educational experiences.

In addition to being ranked No. 1 for undergraduate teaching for the sixth straight year, �鶹��Ƶ is the only school ranked in the Top 15 across all eight categories included in U.S. News’ “Programs that Enhance Student Experience” rankings. The categories highlight academic and cocurricular programs that are closely linked to student success and positive learning outcomes.

�鶹��Ƶ was again recognized as one of the country’s most innovative schools, earning a No. 8 ranking in the category. The Most Innovative national universities list includes those making innovative improvements in curriculum, faculty, students, campus life, technology or facilities.

The university earned three No. 1 rankings, for Undergraduate Teaching, Learning Communities and First-Year Experiences, while also placing among the nation’s top five for Study Abroad, Service Learning and Senior Capstone experiences.

�鶹��Ƶ’s rankings include:

• #1 – Undergraduate Teaching
• #1 – Learning Communities
• #1 – First-Year Experiences
• #4 (tied) – Study Abroad
• #4 – Senior Capstone
• #5 – Service Learning
• #8 (tied) – Most Innovative
• #11 (tied) – Co-ops/Internships
• #12 (tied) – Undergraduate Research/Creative Projects
• #13 (tied) – Writing in the Disciplines

�鶹��Ƶ’s continued success across the rankings reflects the university’s longstanding emphasis on engaged and experiential learning, close relationships among students, faculty and staff, and a comprehensive educational experience that extends beyond the classroom.

“This year’s U.S. News & World Report rankings reflect what �鶹��Ƶ has long known: exceptional teaching and student success go hand in hand,” said �鶹��Ƶ President Connie Ledoux Book. “The rankings are a powerful affirmation of the value and outcomes of an �鶹��Ƶ education and the university’s teacher-scholar-mentor model. From an �鶹��Ƶ student’s first year, when they are immediately engaged and empowered, to the moment they walk across the graduation stage and beyond, �鶹��Ƶ faculty are intentional about creating opportunities that prepare students to be leaders of impact in this ever-changing world.”

U.S. News & World Report has been producing college rankings since 1983. The rankings are based on an extensive annual data survey of institutions along with opinion surveys of university faculty and administrators. 

“We’re excited to launch �鶹��Ƶ Collect because it gives us a shared digital home for the intellectual and cultural life of the university,” states Dean & University Librarian of Carol Grotnes Belk Library Brian Mathews. “It will preserve important pieces of �鶹��Ƶ’s institutional history while also providing lasting access to faculty and student scholarship, creative work, research, reports, teaching materials and other significant contributions. In that sense, it is both an archive of where �鶹��Ƶ has been and an infrastructure for where we are going.”

What is �鶹��Ƶ Collect?

�鶹��Ƶ Collect is an institutional repository, which is a digital system that is used to disseminate scholarly works created at a single institution. However, �鶹��Ƶ Collect’s scope expands more broadly, allowing data and archival materials to stand in conversation with scholarship.

�鶹��Ƶ Collect is home to three distinct overarching collections: �鶹��Ƶ Works, �鶹��Ƶ Data, and University Archives & Special Collections.

• �鶹��Ƶ Works is a centralized hub to showcase the research, scholarly, creative and teaching-focused work created across campus.
• �鶹��Ƶ Data is home to data created and collected by students, faculty and staff.
• University Archives & Special Collections is the new location for curated images, documents, and ephemera from �鶹��Ƶ, church, and local history from Belk Library’s .

Anyone currently associated with �鶹��Ƶ is eligible to deposit works into the �鶹��Ƶ Works and �鶹��Ƶ Data collections to enhance reach and visibility, both around campus and worldwide.

�鶹��Ƶ Collect worked with three campus partners–the , the , and the Digital and Spatial Humanities Consortium–to showcase examples of faculty and staff work and ensure a smooth campus launch on Aug. 14. Additionally, posters from the have been included to provide examples of how student work can be shared.

What are the benefits & features of �鶹��Ƶ Collect?

“�鶹��Ƶ Collect will empower faculty, staff, and students to better disseminate and promote their work, exercise their rights as authors, and contribute to conversations in research, creative practice, and teaching and learning,” said Coordinator of Research and Publishing and Associate Librarian Jesse Akman. “Moreover, �鶹��Ƶ Collect will simplify grant compliance, improve discoverability for �鶹��Ƶ journals and publications, and strengthen internal communications and institutional memory.”

One of the core goals of �鶹��Ƶ Collect is to provide wider access to works created on �鶹��Ƶ’s campus. With Google Scholar indexing, any work deposited can be discovered by researchers worldwide. Through Creative Commons license options, �鶹��Ƶ creators can more precisely describe how others may use their work. However, for those who may not want their work to be available worldwide, �鶹��Ƶ Collect also provides other access options, including embargos to make public at a later date or internal access to only �鶹��Ƶ users.

The system can also mint DOIs, or digital object identifiers, to provide a persistent identifier that acts as a stable, permanent link back to the work. DOIs help to standardize citations, especially for users outside of �鶹��Ƶ.

�鶹��Ƶ Collect also provides Author Profiles, a centralized portfolio for all works in the repository alongside research interests and external publications. The Author Profiles provide comparative statistics for every work connected to the profile owner, making it even easier to find and share the impact of your work.

“As we enter the final years of Boldly �鶹��Ƶ and consider what it means to “Rise,” �鶹��Ƶ Collect will help position the university for a future where our authors’ works are preserved and accessible, their rights are protected, and our campus is more enmeshed in scholarly communications than ever before,” said Akman.

What can I submit to �鶹��Ƶ Collect?

�鶹��Ƶ Collect accepts a variety of deposits from current faculty, staff and students.

“�鶹��Ƶ Collect expands beyond the scope of a traditional institutional repository to capture the full breadth of work being created on campus today,” said Emma Powell, archivist and assistant librarian and manager of �鶹��Ƶ Collect. “Historically, the �鶹��Ƶ Archives and Special Collections has only collected undergraduate honors theses. This is an exciting opportunity to diversify the works we share.”

Works that can be deposited include, but are not limited to:

• Campus-based publications—serial outputs created and published by campus centers like journals or podcast series
• Conference-based works—works like posters or presentations created for or presented at a disciplinary conference
• Creative works—outputs from those working/studying in creative fields like artwork, choreography, creative writing, filmmaking and original music compositions
• Data, software and code
• Grey literature—documents created to be shared but not be published through traditional means like reports and white papers
• Open publications—works that have been formally published like book chapters and journal articles, and have Open Access (OA) or self-archiving (Green OA) options
• Student works—works completed solely by students that have original writing or research and should be shared beyond the classroom like theses and capstones or SURF and SURE posters and presentations
• Teaching and learning materials—works created for use in the classroom that may be reused and/or adapted by others, like assignments, lectures or other OERs

“Many of our new areas of collecting reflect the university’s continued growth,” Powell said. “We collect teaching and learning materials to reflect the excellence in teaching from our faculty, and allow for a wide range of student work to showcase our expansive undergraduate research. Even our data and code collection connects to the continued work of Data Nexus.”

Submitting your work to �鶹��Ƶ Collect only takes three simple steps:

1. Find or create a work that you or the university hold copyrights to and wish to share further.
2. Go to and navigate to the “Submit” header. Select a submission form and provide basic descriptions (also known as metadata) to make your work more discoverable.
3. Submit your form and wait for the repository team to review. Once the team has ensured the work fits into the system scope and has the necessary metadata, your work will be made available in the system.

Questions?

To learn more, join Belk Library on Monday, September 21 at 1 p.m. for the first workshop in our Scholars’ Toolkit series: Showcasing Your Scholarly and Professional Work in �鶹��Ƶ Collect and ORCiD. .

For further information, visit or email elon-collect@elon.edu.

Olivia Guarino ’26, Ella McGlynn ’26, Anna Grace Gilbert ’27 and Jessica Garcia-Bastida ’27 presented their research at the from July 6-9 in Panamá City, Panamá. Attendance at the conference regularly includes over 1,100 attendees and members from various fields such as developmental psychology, cognitive neuroscience, pediatrics and education.

�ճ����, which is directed by Perkins, focuses on understanding the acquisition of motor skills in infancy (such as crawling and walking), and how they relate to other cognitive and social skills.

Guarino and Garcia-Bastida presented a poster titled, ‘’Can you get the toy?: How walking infants use whole-body problem solving during an object retrieval task.” The two have been working on the project over the past year and have contributed meaningfully to data collection appointments with infants and behavioral video coding and analyses.

Gilbert and McGlynn presented a poster titled, “Take a step!: Links between infant play and mother vocalizations as crawling infants learn to walk” and were co-authors on a symposium presentation titled “Tiny hands, big transitions: Analyzing crawling infants’ target interactions during play as they learn to walk,” and presented by Perkins. This work is part of an ongoing collaboration with , who is a professor in the Department of Psychology and Neuroscience at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Gilbert has made meaningful contributions to the project for the past two years and presented preliminary findings at a different international conference in Prague, Czech Republic last year. McGlynn’s contributions spanned the past year in behavioral video coding and analyses.

Student members of the Infant Development Lab benefitted from networking and professional development opportunities at the conference, including meeting authors whose work they had read for literature reviews, group discussions, and lab meetings, and participating in an Undergraduate Networking Session designed to help researchers and students in making valuable connections for employment and/or graduate study. A notable event was the civic reception, which is usually themed based on the conference location. This year’s reception was on an outdoor terrace and featured dancers and music in culturally traditional attire.

The group also had opportunities between conference sessions to explore Panamá City,

Student travel to the conference was supported by the Undergraduate Research Program and the Department of Psychology, and Perkins’ travel was supported by Dean’s Office of �鶹��Ƶ College, the College of Arts and Sciences. Mentored students in the Infant Development Lab come from a variety of diverse backgrounds and go on to graduate and professional programs.

Perkins is an active scholar in developmental psychology and mentoring relationships in higher education. Her research has been published in journals such as “Child Development,” “Infancy,” and “Infant Behavior and Development,”  “Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Psychology,” the “Journal of First-generation Student Success” and “Perspectives on Undergraduate Research Mentoring.” She is currently working on a co-edited book on mentoring and/as meaningful relationships as a high-impact practice published by Routledge, cross-listed in the AAC&U series, and the series on engaged learning and teaching.

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• The Month in Photos: April 2026

While many students are away for the summer, July remained a busy month at �鶹��Ƶ. Student researchers shared the results of projects driven by curiosity and purpose, high school students experienced campus through summer programs and the university continued to welcome visitors for camps and community events. Take a look back at some of the month’s highlights through the eyes of the staff in University Communications.

�鶹��Ƶ Engage

The Engage program at �鶹��Ƶ provides an opportunity for incoming students to spend a week on campus before their first semester, learning more about the university and volunteering in the local community. It is one of �鶹��Ƶ’s First-Year Summer Experience (FSE) programs, which gives incoming �鶹��Ƶ students a preview of the university during the summer before their first semester

Adventures in Leadership

Another FSE program, Adventures in Leadership, allows incoming first-year students to explore the outdoors across North Carolina.

A combined College Coffee

�鶹��Ƶ faculty and staff visited Queens University for a day of collaborative learning, professional development and Queens’ first-ever College Coffee event fostering connection and community between both institutions.

Research together

More than 50 �鶹��Ƶ and Queens University of Charlotte students came together for the annual Summer Undergraduate Research Experience presentations on July 23 in Schar Hall.

The largest Odyssey

�鶹��Ƶ’s Odyssey Program welcomed its largest cohort in history during Odyssey Week, a collection of events that introduces the students to the scholarship program and college life.

Phoenix Summer

�鶹��Ƶ hosted its inaugural Phoenix Summer residential camp this month for rising high school juniors and seniors interested in preparing for the transition to college.

Twenty-six students participated in Phoenix Summer, held July 6-17 on �鶹��Ƶ’s campus, where they immersed themselves in hands-on, college-style academics while fostering curiosity, community and independence.

Off-the-Court

Seven incoming first-year students explored careers in the sport industry this summer through the Off-the-Court First Year Summer Experience, an immersive program designed to help students discover where they fit in the business of sport before declaring a major.

Led by sport management faculty members Cara Lucia and Khirey Walker, participants toured �鶹��Ƶ Athletics facilities, connected with alumni in Charlotte, toured Truist Field, home of the Charlotte Knights, and visited organizations such as the Carolina Core Elite Training Center and the Burlington Sock Puppets, gaining firsthand insight into the many career paths within the sport industry.

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• �鶹��Ƶ holds largest-ever Spring Undergraduate Research Forum
• Personal experience inspires �鶹��Ƶ student’s research to help children experiencing homelessness

Dozens of students showcased research projects inspired by personal experiences and academic interests, guided by faculty mentorship, during the 2026 Summer Undergraduate Research Experience presentations on July 23 in Schar Hall.

The most recent SURE symposium featured more than 50 students from both �鶹��Ƶ and Queens University of Charlotte, marking the latest example of collaboration between two institutions in the process of merging into a united community.

“SURE continues to be one of the flagship events of �鶹��Ƶ’s Undergraduate Research Program. This poster session is a celebration of their dedication and growth as budding young scholars,” said Justin Clar, director of undergraduate research and associate professor of chemistry. “I was especially pleased that we were joined by amazing students from Queens who shared their work with the �鶹��Ƶ community.”

At �鶹��Ƶ, the Summer Undergraduate Research Experience has for years provided student researchers with a stipend to spend eight weeks working full-time on a project in collaboration with a faculty mentor with substantial and recognized expertise in the discipline.

The program concludes every July with a symposium that deepens students’ knowledge of the research experience while offering an opportunity to grow their public speaking and presentation skills.

“It was a great opportunity for the students to share their summer research in a low-stakes environment,” said Kira McEntire, director of undergraduate research and creative work; and associate professor of biology at Queens. “It was also fun to see the �鶹��Ƶ students sharing their summer projects and to learn about some of the interests of �鶹��Ƶ colleagues.”

At Queens, the university holds its annual in the spring, a campus-wide celebration of academic inquiry and community impact. The day starts with oral and poster presentations, followed by service activities in the afternoon.

Personal connections

For many students at SURE, like �鶹��Ƶ student Thomas Gress ’27, projects carried a deeply personal connection. Gress designed a four-week study comparing exercise approaches for people with chronic fatigue syndrome, inspired in part by his brother’s experience with the condition.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the condition is a serious and often long-lasting illness that keeps people from doing their usual activities. It makes physical and mental exertion difficult, and symptoms include difficulty thinking, severe tiredness, and other issues.

“Before I started this project, (my brother had) been suffering for four years, and there seemed to be no end in sight. So, this was something small that I could do to be of use,” said Gress, a biology major from Savannah, Georgia. “For all of these patients, there’s no other option. There are no drugs available, only a few supplements with very little efficacy. So, it seems the best option is experimenting with lifestyle. And if not this, then there is nothing.”

Queens student Isabella Sherman ’27 has a love for nature that inspired her to explore plant communities at the Carolina Wildlands Foundation with mentor E. Davis Carter, assistant professor of biology at Queens.

“It was an excellent experience,” said Sherman, a conservation biology major from Charlotte. “It’s really close to what I want to do with my career. I love research, I love forestry, and every time I went out there, I was like, ‘This is exactly what I want to do.’ This kind of information is what people take into consideration when they’re trying to develop land or provide an additional environment for fauna and flora.”

Mentoring relationships

A common thread among many of the projects was the close relationship students developed with their faculty mentors.

Anna Grace Gilbert ’27, an �鶹��Ƶ psychology major from Knoxville, Tennessee, says Associate Professor of Psychology Sabrina Perkins “completely changed” her undergraduate experience through their work studying infant motor development.

“I’ve worked with (Professor Perkins) technically since the summer of my freshman year. I just reached out to her and was like, ‘I love babies. I’d love to work with you,” Gilbert said. “I’m very grateful. We’ve really bonded over these almost three years.”

For Jack VanValkenburg ’27, a Queens student majoring in data analytics, undergraduate research provided an opportunity to apply his technical skills. He worked with Queens Assistant Professor of Biology Denni Einersson to develop a computerized system for organizing trash collected during community cleanup events.

“It was a great opportunity to work with people who know more than me. The coding that I’ve done in the past is more analytical and this was more developmental,” said VanValkenburg, who is from Atlanta. “(Clean-up crews) would go out with field cards, like pencil and paper, and just mark things down, which was super timely and it’s very inconvenient, and then that just led to a lot of data that wasn’t being used.”

Pushing through the learning process

�鶹��Ƶ business analytics major Chase Hannibal ’28 examined the sense of belonging among Black business students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities and Predominantly White Institutions. It can sometimes feel isolating as a Black female business student, Hannibal said.

“I just wanted to see if other students felt that way, and if it was a pattern, what could be fixed,” Hannibal said. “(I wanted to) let other students know that you’re not alone.”

Hannibal says her mentor, Shanetta Pendleton, assistant professor of strategic communications, pushed her to be better, even when she was at her “stopping point.”

“Even when I felt at the worst of the worst, she supported me throughout everything,” Hannibal said. “She was great, and I’m very excited to work with her in the future.”

Amelia Weaver ’28 also explored the experiences of college students, particularly women. Her �鶹��Ƶ Honors Fellows research examines the motivations of college-aged women who participate in sports betting after she noticed women were less vocal about the topic in class discussions.

“It made me think about why the women in the class weren’t as talkative or excited about their own experiences with sports betting,” said Weaver, a sport management and media analytics double major with a minor in . “I wondered if this was because they didn’t participate, didn’t care, or they just didn’t want to say anything.”

Weaver said her mentor, Alex Traugutt, an assistant professor of sport management, has helped guide her through the process.

“He immediately said, ‘This is going to be a partnership. We’re going to take steps together. We’re going to figure this out together. I’m not just going to throw you into everything,’” said Weaver. “That’s been really helpful in the learning process.”

Students apply to the annual research symposium, which usually takes place during the summer before the junior or senior year. It is one of several opportunities for students to showcase undergraduate research, a cornerstone of the �鶹��Ƶ education and one of the five �鶹��Ƶ Experiences. Students are also able to present scholarly work at the Spring Undergraduate Research Forum.

Presentations encompass a variety of topics, including helping teachers work with students facing homelessness, finding therapies for an ‘elusive chronic disease‘ and studying the motivations of women participating in sports betting. 

There will be two separate poster presentations:

• 9 to 10:15 a.m.
• 10:30 to 11:45 a.m.

The �鶹��Ƶ community is invited to attend and learn more about the students’ scholarship.

For his first undergraduate research project at �鶹��Ƶ, Thomas Gress ’27 is looking to make an impact on people suffering from chronic fatigue syndrome, including his own brother.

“Before I started this, he’d been suffering for four years, and there seemed to be no end in sight,” said Gress, a biology major from Savannah, Georgia. “So, this was something small that I could do to be of use.”

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) is a serious and often long-lasting illness that keeps people from doing their usual activities. It makes physical and mental exertion difficult, and symptoms include trouble thinking, severe tiredness and other symptoms.

“It’s a bit of an elusive chronic disease,” Gress said. “There are no pharmacotherapies available and there are no biomarkers for confirmed disease, so all we can do is experiment with lifestyle, and a big part of that is exercise.”

Exercise is the focus of Gress’ research, working with Professor of Exercise Science Eric Hall to design a four-week study to compare two different approaches to exercise. Before the study begins, each participant undergoes a walking test to determine their comfortable walking distance. Most participants are expected to walk between 10 and 20 minutes, although no one is expected to walk for more than 45 minutes.

Participants are then divided into two groups: graded exercise therapy and pacing therapy. The study focuses on the concept of an “energy envelope,” a term used to describe the amount of physical activity a person’s body can comfortably perform. One approach suggests that people may benefit from gradually pushing beyond their usual limits, while the other suggests that people should stay within their comfort zone and adjust activity levels based on how they feel.

During the study, participants use their baseline walking time to set weekly goals. In the first week, they are asked to walk for 80% of their baseline time. This increases to 90% in the second week, 100% in the third week and 110% in the fourth week. However, there is an important difference between the two groups. Participants in the graded exercise therapy group are required to follow this schedule exactly. Participants in the pacing therapy group are encouraged to follow the schedule but have the flexibility to adjust their activity based on their energy levels and personal needs.

Gress will present his research at the Summer Undergraduate Research Experience (SURE) presentations on July 23 in the Snow Family Grand Atrium. Students apply to the annual research symposium, which usually takes place during the summer before the junior or senior year. It is one of several opportunities for students to showcase undergraduate research, a cornerstone of the �鶹��Ƶ education and one of the five �鶹��Ƶ Experiences. Students are also able to present scholarly work at the Spring Undergraduate Research Forum.

Gress hopes this research will reveal which approach is more effective at helping participants stay committed to the program and whether either method leads to lower levels of fatigue, hopefully helping people with CFS.

“For all of these patients, there’s no other option,” Gress said. “There are no drugs available, only a few supplements with very little efficacy. So, it seems the best option is experimenting with lifestyle. And if not this, then there is nothing.”

“The class told us about ‘doubled-up homelessness,’ where you’re living with family or others, and you’re living under a roof, but it’s not your home. I had no idea that was a thing,” said Brandon, an elementary education major from Hastings, Michigan.

Now, Brandon is working with Jill McSweeney, assistant director of the Center for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning, and assistant professor of wellness, on a project examining the ways that North Carolina elementary school teachers and homeless liaisons are collaborating to help students experiencing homelessness.

According to Brandon, each North Carolina school district has a homeless education liaison responsible for managing resources, funding and teacher training. Brandon and McSweeney are working with the North Carolina Homeless Education Program to survey and interview teachers across the state to improve the training educators receive on supporting students experiencing homelessness.

“A liaison can be the best liaison in the whole world, and they can’t be with every student in the district supporting their needs every day and seeing their day-to-day life like a teacher does,” Brandon said. “But in North Carolina and nationwide, most teachers are never trained by their liaison just because there’s not enough time. They have no idea about all the funding that is available to them, and instead they’re spending hundreds of dollars every year out of their own pocket to buy food, clothing and hygiene products.”

Brandon will be presenting her work at the Summer Undergraduate Research Experience (SURE) presentations on July 23 in the Snow Family Grand Atrium. Students apply to the annual research symposium, which usually takes place during the summer before the junior or senior year. It is one of several opportunities for students to showcase undergraduate research, a cornerstone of the �鶹��Ƶ education and one of the five �鶹��Ƶ Experiences. Students are also able to present scholarly work at the Spring Undergraduate Research Forum.

Working with McSweeney, Brandon says, has been a transformative experience. McSweeney’s research area focuses on college student experiences on campus and in the classroom, along with a broad focus on teaching and learning. But Brandon says, despite not focusing specifically on K-12 education, McSweeney was excited to work with her.

“I cannot imagine what my undergraduate experience would be like if Jill McSweeney was not my mentor,” Brandon said. “She taught me how to do research because Teaching Fellows are not only expected to do research, but our course schedules are so rigorous that we can’t take a methods course. So, she was helping me with my research, teaching me how to do research, and what research methods were, and also showing me how to navigate higher education as a system.”

As Brandon prepares to graduate next spring, she hopes to continue her education at �鶹��Ƶ through the Teach for Alamance program. The �鶹��Ƶ scholarship program provides full tuition remission and a small stipend to teacher-candidate graduates of the Dr. Jo Watts Williams School of Education who wish to enroll in �鶹��Ƶ’s Master of Education program. This project, she hopes, will also help her future colleagues in the Alamance-Burlington School System.

“I wanted to make sure that I was doing research that would have an impact that reached the people that it was about and not just the academic community,” Brandon said. “I know that I can’t redesign legal systems, and I can’t fix all of the state’s problems that are causing homelessness to happen. I wanted to see what the most is that I could do with undergraduate research to make sure that more students are supported.”