image of LAURA student and Professor Steve Windisch standing informs of a backdrop

The College of Liberal Arts’ student body is driven by curiosity and questioning. We encourage all our students to participate in research and help create knowledge. The College of Liberal Arts offers funding opportunities each semester, including summer, to afford students to undertake critical and impactful work. Our Liberal Arts Undergraduate Research Awards (LAURAs) are College funded awards with bi-annual calls for proposals.

The Liberal Arts Undergraduate Research Awards (LAURAs). The LAURAs grant $2,000 each to undergraduate student-faculty member duos to conduct a research project over the course of a semester. Each student earns a $15/hour stipend from the grant while spending 100 hours on the project, which enables students to dedicate their time to developing research skills without having to worry about their financial wellbeing.

The Liberal Arts Undergraduate Research Awards (LAURA) creates more opportunities for undergraduate students to develop research skills by working with faculty mentors on faculty-led research projects while increasing support for faculty research in the College of Liberal Arts. 

LAURA Scholars Teams Share Experiences

Student-faculty teams worked together over the course of a semester or summer on a research project of mutual interest. Visit our LAURA Scholars Testimonials page and watch the videos to see some of the experiences from our faculty and students! 

Faculty and Student Research Teams

The College of Liberal Arts is pleased to announce the Fall and Summer 2024 LAURA Scholar Awards:

Summer 2024

  • Eunice Y. Chen (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Amelia Blumberg for Pilot studies assessing the factors affecting energy balance
  • Elise Chor (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Nicholas Weitzel for Preschool Participation and Children’s Time Use
  • Tania Giovannetti (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Julina Hossfeld for Developing an Automated Scoring Program to Assess Cognition in Older Adults: An International and Interdisciplinary Project
  • Tania Giovannetti (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Yuki Tsuchiya for An International and Interdisciplinary Collaboration to Produce an Efficient and User-friendly Function-based Assessment of Cognition for Older Adults
  • Matt Graham (Political Science) and student Binh Hoang for Covariate Adjustment in Theory and Practice
  • Alexandra Guisinger (Political Science) and student Anna Rowland for Foreign Policy in a Diverse Society: How does race, ethnicity, and gender shape perceptions of economic foreign policy?
  • Michael Hagen (Political Science) and student Steve Binod for The Struggle over Voting Rights in Philadelphia and Pennsylvania
  • Kevin Henry  (Geography and Urban Studies) and student Madelyn Bower for Exploring the relationship between residence in an Asian enclave and breast cancer stage for Asian women
  • Matthew Hiller (Criminal Justice) and student Lea Readinger Canta for Risk-Need-Responsivity Probation Officer Training: A Meta-Analysis
  • Veronica Jacome and student Titilayo Brown for Labor Power, Consumer Capitalism and Lightless Tuesday in An Electrifying US 
  • Jeremy Mennis Geography and Urban Studies) and student Luke Mathers for Building a Dataset of Individual Escapes from Slavery on the Underground Railroad to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in the 1840s and 1850s
  • Alan McPherson (History) and student Nolan Greenways for Vengeance in American Foreign Relations
  • Lauren Olsen (Sociology) and student Siyona Keya for U.S. Medical School Leaders’ Responses to Restrictive Abortion Policies
  • Hamil Pearsall and student Robyn Kerachsky for Environmental Scan of Outdoor Programming in Philadelphia

Fall 2024

  • Kevin Henry (Geography and Urban Studies) and student Madelyn Bower for Exploring the relationship between residence in an Asian enclave and breast cancer stage for Asian women
  • Karen Hersch (Greek and Roman Classics) and student Thomas Fishman for Vestals of the Barnyard: The Sacred Chickens of Rome and the Riddle of Gallinaceous Virginity
  • Artemy Kalinovsky (History) and student Vivek Ayer for Pipeline Politics and Development in Post-Soviet Eurasia 
  • Judith A. Levine (Sociology) and student Kyla McDermott for Landing a Job: Moving from College to Employment in the New Economy
  • Patricia Melzer (German) and student August Horn for Alternative masculinities in the (West) German left-radical political movement Autonome (chapter draft)
  • Leslie Reeder-Myers (Anthropology) and student Neamiah Pedraza for Community Archaeology and Museology: Bringing Timbuctoo (Back) to Temple
  • Jessica Roney (History) and student Tina Jasz for The Revolution Out of Bounds – Building a City Overnight 
  • David V.  Smith (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Ashley Hawk for White matter hyperintensity burden and premature brain aging: Assessing moderating influences of environmental stressors and social support
  • Jessica Stanton (Political Science) and student Erica Stone for Global Anti-Terrorism Law: Criminalizing Support for and Incitement of Terrorism
image of a student testimonial on a table tent for the 2022 LAURA ceremony

Past LAURA Scholar Awards