The University of Montana offers students the opportunity to engage in undergraduate research and creative scholarship under the supervision of a faculty mentor. Any undergraduate student in good academic standing may propose an Undergraduate Research Project by approaching a faculty member and asking him/her to supervise the project for independent study or senior thesis course credit. The faculty member must be willing to evaluate and grade the student’s research project, and the student must develop a project that entails the completion of academic assignments of sufficient scope to justify the agreed number of credits.

An Undergraduate Research Project should explore topics of inquiry that fall outside the scope of regular academic courses and enable the student to embark upon a truly original path of discovery. Students need to find an area of interest, frame a valid research question, and develop a suitable methodology for discovering the answer to that question. Your faculty mentor will provide the discipline-specific criteria necessary for your work. Generally, it is a good idea to choose a faculty mentor with whom you have worked before, and whose own field of scholarship is appropriate to the proposed project.