Office of Student Research is Newest University Resource

To further Truman’s growing research reputation, the University has created the Office of Student Research to promote, facilitate, highlight and assess faculty-mentored student research across all disciplines.

Matthew Beaky, associate professor of physics, has been tapped to serve as the inaugural OSR director, and is currently in the first year of a three-year term.

The OSR will support research in four main areas, including: academic year research; summer research; external funding and grants support; and publication, presentations and publicity.

One of the main responsibilities of the OSR will be to oversee all aspects of the University’s annual Student Research Conference. It will also coordinate yearly travel to the National Conference on Undergraduate Research and manage Truman’s Summer Undergraduate Research/Scholarship grants.

Additionally, the OSR will assess participation in, and quality of, undergraduate and graduate research opportunities, as well as work with faculty to identify academic year and summer research opportunities on campus and provide a central clearinghouse for students to learn about and apply for these opportunities.

According to Beaky, long-term goals, contingent on available time and funding, include the initiation and coordination of a statewide Missouri Research Conference on Undergraduate Research to bring together undergraduates from colleges and universities from across the state. The production of an annual or biannual journal that highlights student research is also a future goal of the OSR, as is the coordination of student travel to regional and national conferences to present the results of their research.

The OSR is located in Baldwin Hall 110, and is in the process of developing a website to promote and coordinate student research and scholarship activities. Anyone wanting to contact the OSR can call 785.4455 or e-mail osr@truman.edu.

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