Emerging Scholars Projects

2026-2027

Echoes of the Unseen

  • Professor: Pouya Afshar, Art and Design
  • Students: Jeidalyn Bonilla, Animation and Interactive Media and Jake Fisher, Animation and Interactive Media

Project description:

Echoes of the Unseen is a trilogy of poetic animated short films focusing on story, visual design, and character-driven, minimalist animation. Inspired by the spiritual parables of Maulana Jalaluddin Rumi, the project explores themes of perception, liberation, and transformation through metaphor, silence, and motion. Each short film stands alone as a contemplative experience, while together they trace a cyclical journey from confusion to clarity, from captivity to release, and from form to formlessness.

As an Emerging Scholar, you will play a crucial role in the pre-production phase of this project, contributing to storyboarding, visual development, character and environment design, and exploratory animation tests. You will work closely with Professor Pouya Afshar, receiving mentorship in professional animation workflows and poetic visual storytelling approaches.

This opportunity is ideal for students interested in 2D animation, concept art, experimental or minimalist animation, and sequential or symbolic storytelling. You will gain hands-on experience using industry-standard software such as Toon Boom Harmony and Photoshop, while helping develop a refined short film intended for both festival and installation-based exhibition contexts. If you’re eager to engage with meaningful narrative work, explore animation as a contemplative medium, and build a strong portfolio piece grounded in artistic intention, apply to the Emerging Scholars program and become part of Echoes of the Unseen.


The Emergence of the Far-Right in Latin America

  • Professor: Rodrigo Castro Cornejo, Political Science
  • Students: Lara El Amme Pingitore, Political Science and World Languages and Niko Faller, Sound Recording Technology

Project description:

This research project seeks to study why the far-right in Latin America—particularly populist authoritarian candidates—is electorally relevant in some countries but not in others. The focus of this project will be on Latin America, specifically Mexico and Brazil. While Brazil has experienced significant backlash from conservative groups, leading to the rise of figures like Jair Bolsonaro, Mexico has not seen the emergence of a comparable far-right movement despite progressive legal reforms. This research project examines how conservative political actors, Non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and media outlets in Brazil and Mexico have responded to progressive legislation, particularly regarding Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer (or Questioning)+ (LGBTQ+) rights, abortion, and other socio-cultural policies. What factors contribute to strong conservative backlash in some contexts but not others? How do media narratives shape public perception of progressive policies? The project will employ qualitative and quantitative methods, including literature review and public opinion data analysis. The student collaborator will assist with conducting literature reviews on progressive legislation in Brazil and Mexico, analyzing reactions from conservative political parties, NGOs, and media, examining media coverage of progressive policies, and assisting in the analysis of survey data (training will be provided). The ideal student should have strong research and analytical skills, attention to detail, and an interest in political science and public opinion. Ability to speak/understand Spanish and/or Portuguese preferred but not required.


Exploring the Nexus of Human Trafficking and Drug Trafficking in a Border County

  • Professor: Amber Horning Ruf, Criminology and Justice Studies
  • Student: Emily Willard, Psychology

Project description:

This project titled Exploring the Nexus of Human Trafficking and Drug Trafficking in a Border County is funded by the National Institute of Justice and investigates how criminal networks operate across multiple illicit markets, focusing on the intersection of drug trafficking and human trafficking in a U.S. border region. Rather than treating these activities as separate phenomena, the study examines how organized criminal groups may overlap, coordinate, or adapt their operations across markets, particularly in ways that exploit individuals facing heightened social and economic vulnerability. By centering network dynamics and organizational behavior, the project seeks to better understand how exploitation is structured, sustained, and normalized within interconnected criminal enterprises. Using a mixed-methods research approach that combines qualitative interviews with analysis of legal and investigative records, the study aims to generate new insights into how these networks recruit, manage, and control people within illicit economies, as well as the challenges authorities face in disrupting them. The findings will contribute to scholarly knowledge on organized crime and trafficking while also informing policy and practice by identifying points of intervention that may reduce victimization and weaken multi-market criminal operations.


Examining Health Insurance Literacy Through Behavioral Measurement and Intervention

  • Professor: Anita Li, Psychology
  • Student: Jaris Delvalle, Psychology

Project description:

The U.S. healthcare system can be difficult to navigate, and many people struggle to understand health insurance coverage, costs, and benefits. Low health insurance literacy is often linked to avoiding healthcare, which can delay treatment and prevent people from seeking important information. This research project aims to improve people’s understanding of health insurance and increase confidence in using it. The project will first focus on developing a health insurance literacy assessment that includes behavioral measures. Next, a pilot training program will be created to help people better understand how health insurance works. Ultimately, this work will help inform future interventions designed to improve health insurance literacy. Ideal applicants will have a background or interest in learning and behavior, comfort reading and summarizing scholarly research articles, and strong attention to detail. Students with an interest in healthcare are especially encouraged to apply. This project offers opportunities to develop valuable research skills, collaborate closely with a faculty mentor, and contribute as a co-author on conference presentations and academic manuscripts in a supportive and collaborative learning environment.


Legitimizing Evolution: Social Implications of a New Discipline

  • Professor: Alison McConwell, Philosophy
  • Student: Benjamin Zeraschi, Philosophy and World Languages

Project description:

Evolutionary biology is a subfield that examines life processes such as natural selection and speciation. A critical turning point in the study of evolutionary biology emerged between 1930-1950, in what scientists call the “modern synthesis” that united fields like genetics, paleontology, and systematics. While the technical aspects of this important scientific advance have been analyzed with some care by sociologists, historians, and scientists themselves, philosophers have not yet carefully considered the social implications of this new discipline. This research project will assess the social and scientific consequences of proposing biologists as the new authority over social issues following the turn of the 20th century. For the decades on either side of World War II, how did the new role of biologists as “social engineers” emerge, evolve, and impact broader social problems? And can any lessons be drawn about the emergence of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM), such as at UMass Lowell and in other universities and academic settings, concerning STEM’s current influence on social controversies in society? This project seeks to process archival items already gathered from university Special Collections, generate chronologies of correspondence and technical research using timeline software, discuss and curate primary and secondary literature reviews and bibliographies, and generate analyses of significant celebrity evolutionary scientists working during and just after this time. Such scientists included Theodosius Dobzhansky, J.B.S. Haldane, Julian S. Huxley, George G. Simpson, and G. Ledyard Stebbins, as well as others like Ernst Mayr, R.A. Fisher, and Sewell Wright, and following that period Stephen J. Gould. Students with a critical lens on knowledge and society and an interest in archival research are encouraged to apply.


A Short Documentary Film about Portuguese Community of Lowell, Massachusetts

  • Professor: Pavel Romaniko, Art and Design / Digital Media
  • Student: Madelyn Argueta Mendez, Graphic Design

Project description:

This Emerging Scholars project centers on the production of a documentary film exploring the history and cultural impact of the Azorean diaspora in Lowell’s Back Central neighborhood. Using documentary filmmaking as a research method, the project examines how Portuguese-American communities formed, sustained cultural traditions, and shaped the city’s social and cultural landscape. The documentary draws on historical research, archival materials from the Portuguese American Digital Archive (PADA), a Lowell Union of Portuguese Americans (LUPA) sponsored photography project by Kevin Harkins from the early 1980s, and community-based video interviews conducted as part of ongoing research. These materials inform the film’s narrative and visual approach while grounding the project in local history and lived experience. The Emerging Scholar will work closely with faculty during the 2026–2027 academic year, collaborating on documentary research and content development, organizing and reviewing video interviews and media materials, and supporting filming. This opportunity is ideal for students with an interest in media production or documentary storytelling, basic video production or editing experience, strong organizational and research skills, and the ability to work independently and collaboratively.


How Reproducible Is Human Epigenetics Research? A Systematic Review of Exposome Epigenome-Wide Association Studies (EWAS) Reproducibility Current Practice

  • Professor: Sarah Merrill, Psychology
  • Student: Owen Schultz, Psychology and Sociology

Project description:

The proposed project is a meta-science study, meaning it examines how scientific research is conducted and reported rather than generating new biological data. Specifically, the project is a structured survey of the field of epigenetics. Epigenetics refers to chemical modifications to DNA that influence how genes are regulated without changing the underlying genetic code.

One common epigenetic marker, DNA methylation, is widely studied, and researchers often conduct large-scale studies that scan across the genome to test whether patterns of DNA methylation are associated with social experiences, environmental exposures, or health outcomes. These studies are frequently described as reproducible or validated. However, there is substantial variation in what researchers mean by “replication,” “validation,” and “reproducibility,” and in how these standards are implemented in practice. The central question of this project is straightforward: What do scientists studying epigenetics actually do to demonstrate reproducibility, and how does that compare to what the field says should be done?

The project is already in an advanced planning stage. A detailed protocol specifies which published studies will be included, which features of reproducibility will be recorded, how key terms such as replication and validation will be defined, and how ambiguous cases will be handled. The next phase involves systematically applying this protocol to a defined set of published epigenetic studies. An Emerging Scholar would play a central role in this implementation phase. The student would be trained to review articles and supplementary materials and to extract information about reproducibility practices using a standardized template. The student would not design the protocol or make final adjudications but would contribute directly to building the empirical dataset that allows the field to evaluate its own standards. The project includes collaboration with senior researchers at other institutions, who will contribute to interpretation and manuscript preparation. All extracted data will be reviewed by senior investigators, and discrepancies will be resolved collaboratively. This structure ensures that the student’s contributions are well-supported, intellectually meaningful, and integrated into a publishable meta-scientific analysis of research practice in epigenetics.


If maximalist goals, then more (extreme) violence?

  • Professor: MinHyung Joo, Political Science
  • Students: Ram Sastry, Political Science and Economics and Ronan Dowd, Political Science

Project description:

Civil conflicts are academically defined as armed conflicts that involve at least one state actor (for example, government) and at least one non-state actor, typically referred to as rebel groups. Rebel groups engage in armed resistance against the government for a variety of reasons, ranging from political, economic, ethnic, environmental and social grievances to ideological or religious motivations. This project specifically examines whether the nature of rebel goals affects their use of violence, including its intensity, targets, and forms. More specifically, it hypothesizes that rebel groups with maximalist goals—such as the overthrow of a government or the establishment of an independent state—are more likely to engage in highly lethal violence, target civilians, and/or adopt terrorist tactics compared to groups with more moderate or reform-oriented objectives. Potential student tasks include assisting the faculty in various stages of the production of an academic paper, conducting initial research on the topic, conducting and writing a literature review, gathering existing data, cleaning datasets, running statistical models, reporting results, gathering references, and editing manuscripts.


Inequality in Trust Games

  • Professor: David Kingsley, Economics
  • Student: Luke Van Horn, Criminal Justice and Economics

Project description:

Economic Trust Games are widely used to measure trust and trustworthiness in controlled settings. In a standard Trust Game, two participants are each given $10. The first mover (Player 1) decides how much of their endowment to transfer to the second mover (Player 2). The amount sent is tripled, and Player 2 then decides how much of this amount to return to Player 1. If Player 1 trusts Player 2 and Player 2 behaves in a trustworthy manner, both participants can earn more than their initial $10 endowments.

Measures of trust and trustworthiness derived from these games have been linked to important macroeconomic outcomes, including economic growth and development. The underlying intuition is that societies with higher levels of trust face lower transaction costs, as they require less monitoring, enforcement, and litigation in economic exchanges. Cross-country survey data also suggest a positive relationship between trust and income equality: countries with more equal income distributions tend to exhibit higher levels of interpersonal trust. However, there is little experimental research that causally investigates how income inequality affects trust and trustworthiness in economic interactions.

This project will design and implement a Trust Game that introduces inequality—for example, by assigning unequal initial endowments to participants. The goal is to examine how exogenously imposed inequality influences both trusting behavior (how much Player 1 sends) and trustworthiness (how much Player 2 returns).


Criminal Exploitation and Vulnerabilities: How to Understand this Newest Form of Human Trafficking and Protect the Marginalized

  • Professors: Wilson R. Palacios, Criminology and Justice Studies, Amber Horning-Ruf, Criminology and Justice Studies, and Joselyne L. Chenane, Criminology and Justice Studies
  • Students: Amelia Paquette, Criminal Justice and Psychology and Maxine Marzella, Criminal Justice

Project description:

This project examines criminal exploitation through the lens of vulnerability, focusing on how immigrants and other marginalized populations are disproportionately exposed to coercion, fraud, and abuse within illicit and semi-licit economies. Rather than treating exploitation as the result of individual deviance or poor choices, the project situates harm within broader structural conditions, including precarious legal status, labor market exclusion, language barriers, and fear of state authorities that systematically constrain agency and increase exposure to victimization. By employing mixed methods (for example: Quantitative and Qualitative), the research traces how criminal actors leverage these vulnerabilities while formal institutions often fail to provide protection or recourse. By foregrounding the lived experiences of exploited individuals, the project aims: to reframe criminal exploitation as a problem of governance, inequality, and social protection, with direct implications for criminal justice policy, immigration enforcement, and survivor-centered interventions. As an Emerging Scholar, you will conduct a scoping literature review, code literature and legal cases, and may also have the opportunity to interview survivors of criminal exploitation. Prerequisites for this project’s emerging scholar include:

  1. a commitment to social justice and human rights issues,
  2. open to exploring and applying artificial intelligence (AI) based research approaches,
  3. comfortable in employing American Psychological Association (APA) style and formatting for traditional research outputs (TROs),
  4. willing to explore non-traditional research outputs (NTROs) such as photo-voice, digital ethnographies, social media documentation, social policy memos and more
  5. possess effective communication skills, both verbal and written, and
  6. be of a naturally curious, open-minded, responsible, friendly human.

Emerging Scholars Projects 2020-2021

The Effects of Inequality and Cultural Identity on Institutions within a Public Goods Dilemma Experiment
David Kingsley and Aaron Smith Walter
Departments: Economics and Political Science
Students:
Riley Coviello, Economics
Cameron Keyes, Sociology
Description:
When behavior consistent with self-interest conflicts with group welfare, markets often fail, and society may benefit from institutions designed to induce cooperation. The institutions that develop to solve such conflicts are complex and varied and may range from informal, decentralized, enforcement of social norms to formal, centralized, enforcement of laws. Fortunately, similar incentives can be recreated in the lab using workhorse social dilemma experiments, and institutional structures can be placed upon groups to study behavior within a given institution. Institutions alter how individuals within groups interact by creating expectations of behavior and mechanisms by which certain behaviors can be reinforced. Cultural Theory (CT) suggests that people differ in how they expect to interact with institutions or how they think institutions should work. This research will pre-screen participants to measure their cultural view. We will then design various institutions to determine the extent to which one’s cultural view determines their behavior within and their interaction with institutional constraints. Results will help to explain why institutional characteristics vary so greatly across cultures and even within countries.
Our Emerging Scholar will be exposed to the foundational literature in both Cultural Theory and Behavioral Economics, especially as applied to public policy issues. The selected student(s) will also learn how to design and run economic experiments, recruit research participants, and clean and analyze the raw data. It is also anticipated that the student will contribute to the creation and presentation of research at appropriate conferences. This is a great project for students with an interest in issues of inequality, decision-making, and behavioral economic theory.
The Evolution and Devolution of Academic Freedom Around the World
J Angulo and Jenifer Whitten-Woodring
Departments: Education and Political Science
Students:
Connor Stack, History & Sociology
Kunthyliza Leng, Political Science and Peace & Conflict Studies
Description:
Academic Freedom—which we conceptualize as the freedom to learn and the freedom to study and engage in research as well as the freedom to teach and share findings from research—is under threat around the world. Threats today include government attempts to regulate the internet and delete “fake news” and other information deemed dangerous by government officials, the limiting or denying of funding for certain research areas, attempts by religious groups against the teaching of the theory of evolution, and efforts everywhere to rewrite history to minimize inconvenient truths. But really, these threats are not new. Political, religious and economic elites have long sought to limit academic freedom. For this study we develop a novel dataset that measures the level of academic freedom for all available countries from 1948 to 2020. In addition to the dataset, we provide a qualitative narrative of how academic freedom has changed over the years in each country. Finally, we plan to conduct a quantitative analysis of the correlates of academic freedom.
The Emerging Scholar would join our team to conduct historical research and serve as the primary coder for the project. The Emerging Scholar will also help to write country reports on the evolution and devolution of academic freedom. We plan to present the results of our work at the International Studies Association’s 2021 Annual Convention in Las Vegas, and would welcome the Emerging Scholar participation at this conference. Ideally, the Emerging Scholar for this project will be detail oriented with strong writing skills and some course work in research methods. Once the dataset is complete, there will be opportunity for the Emerging Scholar (depending on skills and interests) to assist with the quantitative analysis of the correlates of academic freedom. This project requires a willingness to learn how to use statistical software and some previous exposure to quantitative research methods.
Fostering Writers at UMass Lowell
Ann Dean
Department: English
Student:
Caitlyn Brown, Psychology
Description:
Do all students grow and develop as writers during their undergraduate years at UML? Are students challenged enough and supported enough in their first year and as they develop further with their majors? Do some groups of students change more than others during their time here? Do the policies, bureaucratic structures, teaching styles and curriculum of the University support or hinder growth for all types of writers? This project’s goal is to begin investigating the set of questions above by gathering and organizing information about how students move into and out of first-year writing at UMass Lowell. Specifically, we will ask about placement methods, achievement, long-term outcomes. Information will be gathered by evaluating assessment data and course policies and conducting focus groups. Information that summarizes student and faculty work across all our sections, and across the undergraduate years, will inform the way we structure our courses in the future. Outside UMass Lowell, scholars in the field of writing studies are asking questions about placement, success, and outcomes as well. The consequences of particular policies (such as plagiarism and grading) for particular demographic groups is also the subject of lively debate in the field and our results will add to that conversation.
The Emerging Scholar will participate in conducting focus groups with upper-level students. They will also help with analyzing and evaluating quantitative and qualitative data in relation to the questions above, using SIS, Excel, and Access. Together, we will review materials from faculty related to course policies on plagiarism, lateness, and grading. We will present at one conference during the academic year, and work on a published paper with the option of co-authorship.
The EcoSonic Playground Project (ESPP)
Elissa Johnson Green
Department: Music
Student:
Michael Silveira, Music Studies
Description:
Three pressing issues facing the global learning community are equal access to quality arts education, adequate support for STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics) education, and the fostering of sustainable practices. The EcoSonic Playground Project (ESPP) is a creative, interdisciplinary project that addresses these challenges. It centers on children designing and building large-scale musical instrument structures using PVC pipe and recycled materials found in their local communities. Children follow a design curriculum that guides the making process while allowing them to practice social-cognitive and STEAM skills. This curriculum includes music, visual arts, physics and acoustics, engineering practices, and design thinking. It also supports creative, collaborative, and cross-disciplinary learning. After the instruments are built, we provide educators with a musicianship curriculum that teaches musical skills through improvisation, conducting, and composition. In essence, the ESPP structures are playable sound sculptures that are adaptable to any learning environment and to diverse learning styles. Recognizing that each learning environment is unique and complex, all aspects of the curriculum, including the materials, are tailored to each program.
The Emerging Scholar will train in and perform various aspects of mixed methods research, including data collection. They will participate in data analysis, including video and audio coding, synthesis, thematic classification, and patterning. Other responsibilities include contributing to literature review, contributing to articles that will be submitted to peer-reviewed journals, aiding in writing and submitting grant applications, and contributing to research conference submissions with possibility for co-presenting. I am looking for a student with strong organizational skills, an open-minded approach to learning, a tendency toward divergent thinking, consistency and reliability in work habits, and good listening skills.
Narratives of Return in Francophone African Literatures
Kristen Stern
Department: World Languages and Cultures
Student:
Maxwell Aaronson, Political Science
Description:
In literary studies today, and specifically in French, much emphasis is placed on narratives of migration, usually focusing on the arrival and adaptation of the immigrant in the new country. Much less studied are the many narratives of return to the home country, and the difficult questions of belonging and identity that arise in the places and social situations that were once familiar. After years or decades of exile, these authors, filmmakers, and illustrators all ask us the question, “Can you go home again?” This research project builds on this theme asking: How do francophone writers of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, particularly those from sub-Saharan Africa, express these experiences of return in different forms and genres, including novel, poetry, film, and graphic novel? What similarities and differences can be found in the ways authors represent the return to the home country? How does bringing the stories of returns help scholars and the general public better understand current public discourse around migration, in the French speaking world and elsewhere?
The Emerging Scholar will assist with laying the groundwork for my second book project, tentatively titled Narratives of Return in Francophone African Literatures. The student partner will need to have basic research skills in a humanities discipline, excellent written communication skills in English, and proficiency in French. Tasks assigned to the Emerging Scholar will include composing bibliographies on subjects related to the main research questions, reading and taking notes on scholarly articles and books, annotating bibliographies, writing regular summaries of significant findings, and regular meetings with faculty member to discuss progress of research. There are possibilities of collaboration with the faculty member on conference presentations or developing articles for publication from our findings.
Industrial Organization of Rebel Groups and Rebel Group Behavior
Minnie Minhyug Joo
Department: Political Science
Student:
Madhava Narasimhadevara, Economics and Political Science
Description:
In the recent decades, the world has seen a surge in the number of civil conflicts. Civil conflicts are violent conflicts fought between governments and non-state-actors, namely rebelgroups such as the ISIS in Syria, FARC in Colombia and the ETA in Spain. While the earlystudies on civil conflicts have often `black-boxed' rebel groups to be more or less similar toone another, recent studies have revealed that there is considerable variation in how rebelgroups are organized and how they behave when confronting their respective governments.
This project is aimed at expanding our understanding of the variation in the industrial organization of rebel groups and their behaviors in a systematic manner using quantitative analysis. Currently, a series of papers are being prepared under this project and the Emerging Scholar will be involved in one aspect of this larger project. More specifically, the student will be involved in the part of the project that examines how the presence of violent 3rd-party actors that fight on behalf of the government influence rebel group behavior during civil conflicts. Are rebel groups more likely to use violent tactics when confronted by these violent 3rd party groups? Or will they provide more public goods to their supporters or negotiate with the government? These are some of the questions that will be addressed. The student partner will assist the faculty in various stages of the production of the academic paper(s). These stages include conducting an initial research of the topic, writing a literature review, collecting original data, gathering existing data, cleaning datasets, running statistical models, reporting results, gathering references and editing manuscripts.
Mocking, Minimizing, or Malice: A Content Analysis of Reddit User Comments
Ryan Shields and Kelly Socia
Department: Criminology and Justice Studies
Student:
Lauren Prestia, Sociology
Description:
The proposed project is a qualitative content analysis of public user comments on Reddit, a popular news aggregation and discussion platform. We are interested in examining how Reddit users respond to news articles about teenage minors sexually assaulted by young adults. Particularly, we are interested in exploring comments relating to perpetrators in a leadership role (eg. student/ teacher sexual relationships) and whether responses to these stories are patterned by gender of the victim/offender dyad. Our main research question is whether Reddit user comments on cases of sexual assault differ based on the gender of the individuals involved (i.e., male-on-female; male-on-male; etc.). Our hypothesis is that user comments will be the most dismissive or supportive of sexual abuse incidents occurring between teenage male victims and young adult female perpetrators, and comments to be the most negative towards sexual abuse incidents involving male perpetrators, regardless of the sex of the victim. Our data will include all Reddit user comments posted on news stories about teenage minors (age 13-17) sexually assaulted by young adults (age 18-29) in a leadership position, published from January 1st, 2009 through December 31st, 2019. Analysis will involve qualitatively coding the articles and user comments using a general inductive approach, based in a grounded theory perspective. In addition to this, we will also employ a coding scheme that includes sensitizing concepts, based on prior research findings regarding public perceptions of sexual abuse.
The Emerging Scholar will explore Reddit to identify relevant news stories, document user comments, and manage a spreadsheet/database. Skills required include familiarity with Reddit or similar forum-based websites, the ability to read and track large amounts of textual information, attention to detail, and ability to clearly documents steps taken. The Emerging Scholar will also assist in the study’s qualitative methods, including development of the codebook, coding user comments, and analysis. Finally, the Emerging Scholar can expect to contribute to drafting a manuscript (and be a coauthor) that will detail the study’s main findings.
Influence of Upper Classmen on Freshmen Team Dynamics in an Engineering 
Yanfen Li
Department: Biomedical Engineering
Student:
Angie Moussa, Psychology
Description:
The goal of this project is to understand how freshmen teams interact with each other when going through an engineering design course for the first time, and whether the introduction of upper classmen “Project Managers” will have any potential influence on the freshmen’s professional development and team dynamics. In particular, we are interested in the freshmen’s perceptions on engineering, conflict management and resolution, self-confidence, self-efficacy, and mental health. We are also especially interested in determining whether these influences differ depending on students’ gender identity and ethnicity.
Possible tasks for an Emerging Scholar include interviewing past and current students in the course, and observing teams of freshmen during their meetings, noting communication and disagreements. The Emerging Scholar will create and conduct surveys and analyze the data. They will also be asked to assist with writing abstracts and papers. We anticipate that the Emerging Scholar will be a co-author on a conference paper at the American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference to be held in Long Beach California June 27-30, 2021. If time allows, the student may also conduct similar work (creating and conducting surveys and interviews) in association with SLICE to understand the influence of service-learning on the career outcomes of UML alumni.
Transcription and Analysis of Jazz Improvisation
Garrett Michaelsen
Department: Music
Student:
Daniel Miller, Music Studies
Description:
One of the biggest issues facing the study of jazz improvisation is that only a small number of solo improvisations have been transcribed into musical notation. This severely limits our understanding of what musicians do during their improvisations and how their improvisational practice has changed over time. Fortunately, new methods of analyzing a repertoire of music have emerged in recent years. For this project, we will develop and examine important and unanswered research questions, focusing on the improvisations within a single jazz standard. Specifically, we will examine the ways musicians have approached this same structure over time by analyzing accurate preexisting transcriptions of improvisations from online and print sources as well as our own transcriptions of as many other versions as possible. The approach will involve various methods of computational analysis. Ultimately, we hope to gain a better understanding of how jazz improvisation has changed over its history.
The Emerging Scholar best suited to this project will be a proficient jazz improviser, have highly developed ears, and have experience with music notation software. The student will help collect existing transcriptions and recordings of improvisations, notate and transcribe improvisations, and help craft and answer research questions from our dataset. Work on this project will vastly expand the student’s knowledge of improvisational styles over time, as well as increase aural skills.
The Science of Proverbs:  Parenting for Peace or Discord  
Yahayra Michel
Department: Criminology and Justice Studies
Student:
Debby Fernand, Psychology and Sociology
Description:
Proverbs are brief sayings or phrases that are passed down from generation to generation and are often perceived as truth based on common sense and/or experience.  As a function of our environment, we can do one of two things:  passively learn and adopt the attitudes and behaviors of our parents or actively decide do things differently.  But what does the empirical evidence say about effective parenting practices? This project will focus on exploring the science of proverbs as it pertains to conflict resolution and violent socialization within the context of the family. 
Using the International Parenting Study, this project will make cross-national comparisons based on the reports of more than 10,000 students attending 31 universities in 15 nations.  We will look at parenting practices, styles, and perceptions associated with dysfunctional family dynamics, violence approval and criminal behavior.  We will then compare this to the parenting practices associated with relational restoration, family-based loyalty, and socio-emotional competence.  
The Emerging Scholar will work, in collaboration with the project manager, through all parts of the research process:  from updating and revising the literature review to conducting data analysis and disseminating research findings.  Familiarity with SPSS is preferred.

Who Cares? Understanding the New Landscape of Elder Care

  • Mignon Duffy, Associate Professor of Sociology
  • Andrew Hostetler, Associate Professor of Psychology
  • Franchesca Arias, Sociology
  • Paige DePasquale, Psychology

Heart and Soul: Building Community, Economic Development and Pride in Deindustrialized Rural America

  • Teresa Irene Gonzales, Assistant Professor of Sociology
  • Elizabeth Thissell, Sociology

The EcoSonic Playground Project (ESPP)

  • Elissa Johnson-Green, Assistant Professor of Music and Music Education
  • Caitlin Sampson, Music Studies

The Library of New England Immigration

  • Ingrid Hess, Assistant Profess of Art and Design
  • Hue Le, Graphic Design

Lessons from Myanmar’s Facebook-Driven Genocide: The Divisive Potential of Social Media in an Intolerant Society

  • Jennifer Whitten-Woodring, Associate Professor of Political Science
  • Catherine Abou-Khalil, Political Science
  • Emelia Misail, English

Looking Back and Moving Forward: A Systematic Review of Poly-Victimization Literature

  • Yahayra Michel-Smith, Assistant Teaching Professor School of Criminology and Justice Studies
  • Sara Tolpin, Sociology

Learning and Adaptation among Terrorist Groups

  • Christopher Linebarger, Assistant Professor School of Criminology and Justice Studies
  • Vanessa Giacoumakis, Psychology

Symbolism and Substance: A Dialectic Investigation of Political Imagery and Administrative Materialism

  • Aaron Smith-Walter, Assistant Professor of Political Science
  • Christian Angelucci, Political Science

Save Venice

  • Christopher Carlsmith, Professor of History
  • Magdalene Stathas, Psychology