Getting Started

Step 1: Strengthen your intellectual foundation

• Cultivate strong study, note-taking, and writing routines
• View each task in your courses as a chance to enhance your writing skills, critical thinking, and academic autonomy.

Step 2: Cultivate your intellectual passions

• Maintain a personal notebook for ideas beyond class notes.  Use it to identify connections between your courses.
• Attend special Humanities Center events with distinguished writers, artists, and thinkers.
• Consider the type of project that interests you. Humanities research can take a variety of forms, including digital projects, curated exhibitions, community outreach, or traditional research papers.
• Build your credentials by signing up for the Humanities Engagement Certificate.

Step 3: Find a faculty mentor

• Get to know multiple professors in your fields of interest.
• Explore the research they have published and inquire into what they are currently doing.  It is vital to know what faculty are studying, not just what they teach.
• Try to assist on a faculty project as a research apprentice or lab member.

Step 4: Let us help you!

• The Humanities Center's Research Programs are designed to help you develop as an independent scholar, step-by-step.
• Start with the Path to Research workshop and move on to a methods workshop, lab, or apprenticeship.  
• Gain the experience needed to become a Geoffrion Undergraduate Fellow, working closely in an intense faculty research community.
• Follow Humanities Center event programming and reach out with questions. We are here for you.

Humanities Center Student Research Programs

Over pizza, undergraduates learn about rewards of humanities research and how to plan for independent study.

This one-day workshop helps students design and launch an independent research project. Participants leave with a formal proposal they can use to apply for funding and gain credit through a University Summer Scholarship, Dean’s Scholarship, or honors program.

Humanities Labs bridge classroom learning with community engagement. Under faculty guidance, students enrolled in a lab translate their humanities knowledge into projects that resonate with the public.

Apprentices gain valuable research skills by actively contributing to faculty research projects. Apprentices receive modest fellowship stipends and help faculty with tasks like reading, annotating, content management, web design, proofing, editing, archive exploration, translation, data entry, digital coding, and more. Participants receive modest fellowship stipends.

Dedicated humanities students can now enhance their academic transcript.  Open to all students, the Humanities Certificate shows employers and graduate schools that a student has demonstrated intellectual leadership, wrestled with major social challenges, and gained significant research, writing, and critical thinking skills.

The highest honor conferred by the Humanities Center, the Geoffrion Fellowship allows exceptional undergraduates to join a team of faculty, graduate students, and visiting scholars for a year of intensive study. Geoffrion Fellows attend faculty seminars, conduct supervised research, collaborate on public projects, and help host distinguished visitors.