Research Impact Partners

Connecting Research and Education At TExas (CREATE) was founded in 2017 through a partnership established between Dr. Sean T. Roberts at The University of Texas at Austin (UT) and Dr. Shawn M. Amorde at Austin Community College (ACC) with support from the National Science Foundation. CREATE’s initial goal was to improve community college student retention in the physical sciences by fostering mentorship relationships between ACC students and UT faculty through research projects tied to green energy. Over time, CREATE’s managing team has been broadened to include Dr. Emily Que (UT), Dr. Samantha Soebbing (ACC), Dr. Purna Murthy (ACC), and Dr. Huilang (Evan) Wang (UT) which has allowed its scope to expand into a range of areas in chemistry, molecular biosciences, physics, materials science, and engineering.

The Freshman Research Initiative (FRI) gives first-year students the opportunity to initiate and engage in real-world research experience with faculty and graduate students.

Girls Who Code is an international non-profit organization working to close the gender gap in technology, and leading the movement to inspire, educate and equip young women with the computing skills needed to pursue 21st-century opportunities. The Girls Who Code College Loops are committed to reaching gender parity in tech by creating an inclusive community on campus and offers monthly challenges focused on honing computer science skills and engaging women to take action, collaborate, and create with one another.

The University of Texas High School Research Initiative is a scientific inquiry program focused on training teachers in rural high schools across Texas to successfully lead independent project based research experiences for high school students, infuse inquiry into existing curriculum, and use innovative resources to support inquiry in the classroom. The program provides access to training, resources, and undergraduate mentors to facilitate flexible modular experiences in the health sciences for high school classrooms.

The summer High School Research Academy provides high school students with an immersive and hands-on five-week interdisciplinary research experience at the University of Texas at Austin campus. (Including 9th-12th grade students)

The Office of Institutional Research and Analytics collaborates with researchers to design evaluation plans that are rigorous, trustworthy, and tailored to the needs of the program and/or grant. It provides expertise in designing data collection, analysis and reporting which supports program improvement and meets funder and stakeholder needs.

McNair Scholars is part of the federally funded TRIO programs administered by the U.S. Department of Education, and the only one primarily focused on students' postbaccalaureate success. McNair Scholars seek to increase the number of undergraduate students earning doctoral degrees who are low-income and first-generation. Participants must be serious and committed to enrolling in graduate programs with an end goal of completing a Ph.D. Students selected to participate in McNair Scholars work with both staff (on graduate school literacy) and a faculty mentor (on research and scholarship). Scholars define, develop, and deliver original, independent research projects.

The community engagement team in the Undergraduate College stewards sustainable relationships with local, regional, and statewide communities and organizations toward the goal of supporting mutual benefit for communities and the people of The University.

The Office of Undergraduate Research (OUR) connect PIs with undergraduate research assistants through our student advising and our online database of faculty research interests and projects (https://eureka.utexas.edu). OUR hosts Summer Research Scholars programming to support the professional development of undergraduate researchers taking part in summer research programs (e.g., NSF REUs), and offers a variety of student research funding opportunities and research presentation events to further the work and development of student researchers.

This summer program pairs 2-4 students with a Freshmen Research Initiative Research Stream for a unique two-hour tour of a real scientific laboratory.