Abstract:
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Undergraduate research experience is widely recognized as a way to improve student recruitment, retention and educational experiences. Undergraduate research is especially important for students in statistics to solve real-world problems with data while preparing for post-graduate studies and the workforce. Finding research projects for every student to work individually with faculty can be burdensome. We discuss how we addressed this challenge with an interdisciplinary, cross-administrative course structured around undergraduate research projects. The students were taught foundations of the research process and worked with campus data sources and data stewards to evaluate positive interventions from programs that do not have the resources to analyze their own data. This type of project is common at every college and university. Additionally, students gained teamwork and communication skills by presenting results to stakeholders in both oral and written form. Each student group participated in an undergraduate research symposium. This mutually beneficial arrangement will help sustain a larger, lasting undergraduate research program with mentoring and individualized student support.
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