Reinventing Academia: get involved in undergraduate research

Reinvention is a journal exclusively written and compiled of research papers by undergraduate students. The journal, which is available online, is published twice a year by the Institute of Advanced Teaching and Learning (IATL), and provides the unique opportunity for UG students to publicise their own research papers under professional and educational circumstances. In fact, the journal “only houses papers written by undergraduate students.”

In order to get a paper published in this journal, one must first submit the essay and “upon receipt, submissions are screened by the editorial team and the articles that make it through are sent out for double-blind peer review.” Providing a positive impression by the anonymous peer reviewers, “the editorial team makes a decision to reject the article or provisionally accept it.” When all the suggestions from the Reinvention team and reviewers are carried out by the author, “the article is then copy-edited and uploaded to our website in time for publication,” in the words of Naomi Falkenberg, editor of the journal.

Reinvention has, since its establishment in 2001, branched out and been involved in various other projects, such as the British Conference of Undergraduate Research (BCUR). From the 19th-20th March 2012, the University of Warwick will be hosting the second British Conference of Undergraduate Research, a British conference that is “dedicated to promoting research at undergraduate level across the UK.”
The BCUR is a new annual spring conference, held at a different university each year, which encourages both undergraduates and academic staff to participate. The chief influences of the BCUR have been two American based conferences: the National Conference of Undergraduate Research and the Council for Undergraduate Research. As Susan Brock, an academic manager at IATL says, the BCUR is a means to significantly improve the standard of British undergraduate research.
”The national BCUR Steering Group and its chair Professor Stuart Hampton-Reeves from the University of Central Lancashire – himself a Warwick graduate – have provided invaluable support, as they have the experience of running the first BCUR conference in 2011. Here at Warwick we have a core organising committee which includes students and members of the team at the Institute for Advanced Teaching and Learning, led by Caroline Gibson, the manager of the Reinvention Journal of Undergraduate Research. We shall also be depending on a large team of volunteer student assistants to ensure that the conference proceedings go smoothly,” says Dr. Brock, who strongly believes that the BCUR will be very beneficial for Warwick.

“The conference builds on Warwick’s commitment to undergraduate research, research-led teaching and  student engagement, which are fostered by URSS and IATL’s Student as Producer Research and Performance grants and Collaborative Funds. It will demonstrate Warwick’s commitment to styles of teaching that involve students in their own learning and prepares them for their lives beyond the university. And it offers us a chance to showcase the valuable research work that our undergraduates are doing and the great facilities on the Warwick campus to staff and students from across the UK. Some may even choose to be postgraduates here!” concludes Dr. Brock.
As mentioned before, Reinvention will be playing a vital role in shaping the success of this year’s BCUR. Naomi Falkenburg states: “[We are] committed to promoting undergraduate research and we look forward to publishing another special issue in support of this national project.” Not only are works by Warwick students being published, this special BCUR edition will feature the papers of students from a total of 41 universities, including 6 non-UK universities.
The writings from students of UCLan, Nottingham University, Bournemouth University and Nottingham Trent University will be included in the upcoming special issue. The conference is quickly growing in popularity, renowned for its collaborative sharing and learning, including a wide network of authors, peer reviewers of students and of teaching staff contributing to the process.

Not only will research be presented in academic format, but proposals for interdisciplinary projects such as posters, spoken presentations and workshops have been accepted as well. The topics are widespread, engaging in a variety of academic disciplines, from Veterinary Medicine to Ancient History and Archaeology.
Unfortunately, the call for papers is now officially closed (with the extended deadline having been 18th December 2011), but there is nevertheless the opportunity to attend and be involved in the conference this coming March! An array of academic activities will be on offer, including workshops held by undergraduate students from various different UK universities about various different disciplines. There will also be poster presentations and spoken papers, as well as academic staff sharing “experiences of implementing undergraduate research in their institutions.” 

Furthermore, there will be an open meeting for groups to discuss the future of the British Conference of Undergraduate Research after the academic staff that are attending discuss the development of undergraduate research in British universities. It must be noted that a requirement for future participants is for them to either be current undergraduate students or recent undergraduate students who have conducted their paper during their undergraduate years.
Papers can include dissertations done as part of the individual’s course, an assessment to which the topic was devised by the person themselves, or a research paper done as part of an internship as long as it is in a discipline that is taught in Higher Education. BCUR in particular invites either academic staff or students, or a collaboration of both, who focus theirpaper on the introduction of undergraduate research into modules.
So why should anyone get involved? The British Conference of Undergraduate Research presents a great opportunity for those who want to share their work, as well as for anyone who wants to learn about other disciplines and, more specifically, how those disciplines would approach research problems. Hosting the upcoming BCUR will hopefully encourage and entice Warwick University undergraduates to generate and publish their own academic work, elevating a platform for developing and sharing knowledge.

Furthermore, Reinvention is also working in conjunction with the Warwick Economics Summit this year to develop a project called Future Leaders. This undertaking has encouraged undergraduate students to send the Summit their original research papers on an Economics-related subject by the 10th of December 2011.

Essays are from 2000 to 5000 words in length and with the help of the Reinvention editorial team and its effective peer reviewing system, the top three authors will be chosen to present their research at the Warwick Economics Summit from the 17th-19th February 2012.
A financial bonus is also involved, the top three papers winning a sum of £350 (first place), £100 (second place) and £50 (third place). Lastly, research papers deemed appropriate and academic enough will be published in the next Reinvention issue, due to appear in April 2012.

**__If you have missed the deadlines for Future Leaders project and British Conference of Undergraduate Research, you can still get funding for your own research projects. Undergraduate Research Scholarship Scheme is open for all applications to 1st February, while IATL Scholarship Scheme has ends on 31st January. __**