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Undergraduate Research and Creative Activities Funds

  • Supplies or materials to conduct research (for example, software, materials for the arts, scientific supplies, books/journals that cannot be provided by the library, etc.)
  • Personnel (for example, a stipend provided to undergraduates to conduct research)
  • Travel and/or registration costs for students presenting at a conference (note that we cannot fund students to attend conferences or workshops where they are not listed as a presenter). International travel needs to be approved by the Office of International Safety and Security before an URCA proposal can be reviewed. Please email globalsafety@kennesaw.edu for more information. 
  • Travel costs to collect data.
  • Participant incentives (for example, gift cards for individuals who participate in a survey or experiment).
  • Publication costs

The undergraduates will be required to present their research at the Symposium of Student Scholars. 

Upon the completion of the project(s), recipients are required to complete an assessment survey for the Office of Undergraduate Research that includes presentations/ publications/exhibitions from the work completed. You will be emailed this survey at the end of the academic year.

Questions: our@kennesaw.edu

Please note that the application form and budget table have been updated in August 2022 and should be the only version used going forward. 

Application Due Dates
  • Applications will be accepted on a rolling basis. There are no due dates. As soon as you need funding, apply. We will stop accepting applications in mid-March due to fiscal year deadlines, but you can apply up until that point. 
  • If you are applying for an URCA to support travel to present at a conference, please wait to apply until you have been accepted to present. Attach a copy of your conference acceptance to your application before submitting. 
Funding Amount
  • Limited to a maximum of $1,000 per student per academic year in order to provide as many opportunities for undergraduate researchers as possible. 

  • The Director and/or Associate Director of the Office of Undergraduate Research will review applications with input from faculty experts. URCA submissions are evaluated according to the following criteria:

    • Quality of writing
    • Scholarly merit
    • Impact on undergraduate researcher
    • Mentor track record (or potential track record for new mentors)
    • Mentors
      • Mentors must be under contract at Kennesaw State University.
      • Mentors can be full-time faculty, staff, and postdoctoral researchers
    • Students
      • Students must be current undergraduates at Kennesaw State University.
      • Students who have graduated one semester prior are eligible for conference registration, travel to present at a conference, and publication costs only (in other words, the project is finished, and the only part left is presenting or publishing). The following criteria must be met by students who have recently graduated and are applying for URCA funds: 
        • They are KSU students at the time they have done the work, submitted to the conference or journal, and applied for the URCA
        • They list KSU in their affiliation on posters/powerpoints/conference registration/badges, etc.
        • They are covered by KSU insurance, or they sign a waiver releasing KSU from responsibility
        • It is no later than one term after graduation (summer if they graduate in spring; fall if they graduate in the summer; spring if they graduate in fall) 
    • All KSU-supported research projects are administered in accordance with established University fiscal procedures and research policies. These include all travel regulations, policies relating to the protection of human subjects, and policies related to intellectual property rights. All publications and presentations must acknowledge the assistance of Kennesaw State University.
    • Mentors and students are expected to obtain Institutional Review Board (IRB) or Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) approval prior to collecting any data if the project includes research involving human or animal subjects.
    • Students who are not funded the first time they submit are strongly urged to apply again if they can address the reviewers' concerns.
    • One application per student for one project.  Each student is required to write his/her own application.  Copying from another student applicant will be considered as plagiarism and will be penalized accordingly.
      • Sections written by the mentor can be identical among applications from different students.
    • Requests for materials that could be obtained in another manner (e.g., a book available at the library, software available for free at KSU) will not be funded.
    • DO NOT alter sections of the application. All submissions must utilize the application form with all sections completed.
    • DO NOT include information not requested by the application.
    • A Primary Mentor can be funded for a limited number of URCAs per year based on the availability of funding and at the discretion of the Office of Undergraduate Research.
    • Violation of safety protocols or misuse of funds will result in ineligibility for future funding from the Office of Undergraduate for at least one year. The appropriate penalty will be determined by the Director of Undergraduate Research. Students found to misuse resources, including funding, from the Office of Undergraduate Research will be considered as violators of the KSU Code of Conduct and will be reported to the Department Student Conduct and Academic Integrity.
    • After being notified of the award, recipients will have eight weeks to submit requests for purchasing. An extension can potentially be granted at the discretion of the Director for Undergraduate Research. Recipients must contact the Office of Undergraduate Research (our@kennesaw.edu) within eight weeks after the initial notification. Otherwise, the funding will be considered forfeited.
    • Any awarded funding must be spent by the end of March of the current academic year in order to comply with fiscal year deadlines. 
    • Mentors must complete survey or other reporting requirements as requested by the Office of Undergraduate Research. Mentors who fail to complete reporting requirements will not be eligible for funding from the Office of Undergraduate Research for one (1) year. 
      • This can potentially include abstract(s) of the project results and a list of the presentations/ publications/exhibitions from the work completed.
    • Student recipients will be required to present at the Symposium of Student Scholars during Fall or Spring semester.
    • Mentors for any funding from the Office of Undergraduate Research will be requested to serve as a judge for the Symposium of Student Scholars and potentially as a reviewer for any future funding opportunities for undergraduate research. If these activities are not completed after requests from the Director of OUR, mentors will become ineligible for funding from OUR for at least one year.
    • Student and mentor recipients of Office of Undergraduate Research funding also agree to be featured in any future news stories as deemed appropriate by OUR
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