2 Year Programs with Research Components for Incoming Freshmen

CIVICUS is an academic citation program centered around 5 tenets of civil society: citizenship, leadership, community building in a diverse society, scholarship, and community service-learning. During the final semester of this two-year learning and living program, students participate in a Supervised internship, engage in community service, or complete a research project on a civil society topic. This final project demonstrates the application and continued study of skills and concepts, grounded in the social sciences, relevant to understanding and effectively dealing with contemporary social issues.

Summer Programs for Rising Juniors and Seniors

The program was developed to reinforce the interest of talented and underrepresented students in pursuing academic careers through graduate study. The Summer Research Initiative gives promising undergraduates the opportunity to experience hands-on research and to learn about graduate programs at the University of Maryland. tudents in the program participate in a faculty-guided research project and a twice weekly seminar series, attend off-site visits to local research institutions, and present their research to the University of Maryland academic community in a poster session. Participating academic departments include Anthropology, Criminology & Criminal Justice, Geography, Government & Politics, Hearing & Speech Sciences, Psychology, and Sociology.

Programs by Department

This intensive, six-week field school devotes eight hours daily to supervised archaeological fieldwork, laboratory work, stratigraphic analysis, technical drawing, writing and interpretation. Skill development will focus on: soil identification and description; accurate record keeping and photography; artifact identification and cataloguing; understanding of site formation processes and reconstruction of site stratigraphy; basic surveying and mapping; elements of site report production (e.g., background historical research, reconstruction of site stratigraphy, production of unit summaries and familiarity with professional standards and guidelines for conducting and reporting on fieldwork and laboratory analysis); and public speaking and interpretation.

Most faculty members are actively engaged in research programs which can provide valuable and interesting experiences for the student. Often, in addition to working closely with an individual faculty member, the HESP major has an opportunity to work and interact with other undergraduates, and with graduate students. Various opportunities are available for research experience. Students may go to the HESP faculty research site (www.bsos.umd.edu/hesp/research/overview.htm) to identify potential projects and mentors. Students may also contact individual faculty and graduate students regarding research opportunities.

The IRIS Center provides opportunities for students to apply what they're learning and gain work experience. Students conduct research and assist with the development of policy and analytic papers, studies, and expert presentations and events. Topics include: the Muslim world, HIV/AIDS, water scarcity, local governance, transformational development, and fragile and failed states.

Most faculty members are actively engaged in research programs which can provide valuable and interesting experiences for the student. Often, in addition to working closely with an individual faculty member, the undergraduate student (PSYC major) has an opportunity to work and interact with other undergraduates, and with graduate students. Various opportunities are available for research experience. The Psychology Undergraduate Listserve is one source of possible research positions on campus. Students may also contact individual faculty and graduate students regarding research opportunities.

The National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) offers a number of research opportunities for undergraduates at the University of Maryland. Each semester, START hosts undergraduates in a for-credit internship program that connects students with ongoing, faculty-led research projects related to the study of terrorism and responses to terrorism. Students have worked on projects involving such topics as: terrorist acts committed by ethnic minority groups; geospatial patterns of terrorism; potential terrorist use of radiological/nuclear weapons; and incidents of maritime piracy.

In addition to semester internships, START also runs a summer research program, in which students from across the country work 20-40 hours/week on START research projects while also attending a professional development series designed to provide them in-depth knowledge of terrorism studies research being conducted around the world as well as to facilitate their professional development.

Honors Programs and Research for Credit