Description
The opportunity to work with a faculty member on research helps students refine their research skills, build their resumes, and determine their interest in graduate study. Funding faculty/student research partnerships can lead to peer reviewed publications for the student, as well as opportunities for conference presentation.
How will donations be used?
$3,000 will be used to pay the students the prevailing wage for student research assistants, at 10 hours per week for a semester (16 weeks). An additional $2,000 per student is requested for conference travel. We hope to fund two research assistants.
Personal Message
The Department of Political Science and Criminal Justice serves 600 students across five undergraduate programs and two graduate programs. We educate future public officials, campaign managers, public administrators, public safety officers, and scholars. In addition to our rigorous academic programs, we prepare students for their future careers through internship opportunities in the Community Legal Information Clinic or Sacramento Semester programs. Students also have opportunities to compete with our award winning Model United Nations team, or to present their research through Pi Sigma Alpha, the Political Science Honor society.
Why are donations necessary?
We have historically used work study funds for student researchers, but this is limited to students who are work study eligible. Additionally due to the limited funds, we can only fund students for approximately 30 hours of work with faculty, an insufficient amount of time to bring a research project to fruition as a conference paper or peer-reviewed publication. Funding for a full semester at 10 hours of work per week, plus travel funding for a conference, will allow students and faculty to work together in a meaningful way, and to attain the outcomes (such as conference presentation and/or publication) that will be most impactful for the student.