What it is
A two-year, paid undergraduate research program pairing selected students with a faculty mentor for original research in their field, built on the same framework as the national McNair Scholars program: first-generation, low-income, and underrepresented-minority students preparing for graduate school.
What scholars do
Each scholar designs and carries out a research or creative project with a faculty mentor over two summers and the academic year between them, presents it at a research symposium, and usually co-authors at least one publication or conference presentation before graduating.
Support beyond the research
The program pays a stipend for the summer research terms, covers travel to at least one national conference, and runs a structured graduate-school preparation track — GRE prep, personal statement workshops, funded visits to graduate programs — because getting into a strong graduate program takes more than a good project.
Applying
Applications open in the fall of sophomore year; eligibility mirrors the federal McNair criteria (first-generation and low-income, or from a group underrepresented in graduate study, with a competitive GPA) and selection is by faculty committee based on a research proposal and an interview.
Fictional information
UW–Porter Falls is a work of parody. Every office, person, building, phone number and statistic on this page is invented; nothing here describes a real institution or a service you can actually contact.