Undergraduate Research, Scholarly and Creative Activity Scholarship-New Freshman

Admitted first-year students are invited to apply for New Freshman URSCA Scholarships. These competitive $1,000 scholarships are awarded to students interested in exploring an area of academic interest in greater depth outside of their regular classes. The scholarships are for a student’s first year only and are paid out in $500 increments at the beginning of the fall and spring semesters. Through regular weekly contact with faculty mentors and other, more experienced students working in that area, recipients will have the opportunity to begin pursuing their scholarly interests in their first year at UW-Platteville. Recipients will be expected to present their accomplishments on campus by the end of their first year. For more information and to view the available research opportunities, view the list below under the scholarship criteria.

The following criteria shall be used in the annual selection of the recipient(s):
1. Applicants must be a first-year student
2. Applicants must have a high school GPA of 3.0 or higher

Students selected for the URSCA scholarship will have the opportunity to work in one of the areas below. Applicants will have to list their top 3 choices in order of preference. Every effort will be made to place recipients with a faculty mentor working in the recipient’s first or second choice area.

1. Innovative Testing Methods on Fresh Concrete for Sustainable and Durable Infrastructures (Civil Engineering)
2. Identifying Cellular Organelles with Fluorescent Microscopy (Biology)
3. Developing Novel Plant Disease Management Strategies (Agriculture)
4. Genetic Analyses of Plant-Microbe Symbioses (Agriculture)
5. Plant Growth Promoting Soil Microbes and Plant Health (Agriculture)
6. How an Environmental Non-Profit Organization Navigates Marketing Challenges (Business)
7. Reproduction in Dairy and Beef Animals (Agriculture)
8. Applied Animal Nutrition Research Experience (Agriculture)
9. Enhancing Hydroponic Production Through Experimentation (Agriculture)
10. Developing on-farm biochar management strategies for environmental sustainability (Agriculture)
11. Stand Back and Standby: How Asymmetric Negative Partisanship and Sedition Affect Reactions to Political Violence (History & Social Sciences)
12. The History of Science and Technology in Europe (History & Social Sciences)
13. Misled Minds: Applied Psychology of Misinformation in Everyday Life (Psychology)
14. Wildfire Research (Environmental Sciences & Society)
15. Dendrochronology: The Science of Tree Rings (Environmental Sciences & Society)
16. Environmental Change Research: Advance understanding of past, current, and future environments and the integral role of people therein (Environmental Sciences & Society)
17. Horror in Premodern English Literature and Culture (Humanities)
18. AI, Race, and Environment (Ethnic Studies)