CLAS students awarded for undergrad research

Wayne State University's Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP) recently honored 13 students at the 2016 Wayne State University Undergraduate Research and Creative Projects Conference on Nov. 22. UROP allows Wayne State students to engage in faculty-mentored research opportunities to receive grant funding.

CLAS students Roy Greenia, Gaia Klotz, Jasmine Hect, Brigid Jacob, Isabell Grove, Lauren MacConnachie, Mukund Mohan, Matthew Reesman, Garrett Tuer, Thomas Reesman, and Nicole Witzleben were awarded grant funding for their research. With majors from public health, psychology, biology, and peace and conflict studies, research covered a variety of subjects.

Peace and conflict studies student Gaia Klotz volunteered once a week for five months with Detroit Public Theater's all-female Shakespeare in Prison program at the Huron Valley Correctional Facility in Ypsilanti, Michigan.

"Being afforded the opportunity to conduct research at the undergraduate level has allowed me to take a closer look at concepts, ideas, theories and even my own experiences," said Klotz. "In this project, I was able to form relationships with women that we have cast to the margins of our society and confront my own biases about this country's prison population."

Jasmine Hect, a psychology student whose research project, "Diminished Neural Connectivity in Fetuses that will Subsequently be Born Preterm," said undergraduate research offers invaluable professional development.

"Undergraduate research gives you the chance to work intimately with data and learn how to conduct statistical analyses. It encourages personal development as well, in that it requires hard work, discipline, creative thinking and dedication."

Written by Christiana Castillo, CLAS Public Relations Associate