Undergraduate
research
opportunities
Discover practical solutions to
real-world problems
Are you interested in exploring areas and issues that inspire you to make a difference?
At Messiah University, you don’t have to wait until graduate school to get involved with hands-on research projects. Our undergraduate students have opportunity to participate in meaningful research across all of our 80+ majors.
There are many benefits to participating in undergraduate research, including helping you to:
- Expand the body of knowledge in your area of study
- Contribute practical solutions to real-world problems
- Form valuable mentoring relationships with faculty experts
- Deepen your understanding and expertise in your field
- Think critically and assess research and scholarly works published by others
- Sharpen your own research skills across a variety of disciplines
- Learn to balance working individually and as part of a team
- Decide what academic and career areas interest you most
- Demonstrate capabilities in all of these areas to graduate schools and employers
Faculty-student collaboration
Meaningful faculty-student relationships are an important part of the Messiah educational experience. Your professors strive to get to know you, your strengths and your aspirations.
Faculty
mentorship
low student-faculty
ratio
practical answers to
important questions
Improving the human condition
Messiah students promote the common good through research that serves others and improves the human condition.
Designing a prosthetic hand for a 5-year old girl who wants to ride a bike. Protecting genetic privacy in the age of DNA databases. Reducing food waste on university campuses. Digitally mapping the ethnic history of the capital city of Pennsylvania. Finding ways to remove arsenic from drinking water. These are just some of Messiah students’ research projects that are making the world a better place.
We support you—from proposal to presentation
Depending on your major, you may be able to begin a research project as early as your first year. You’ll have opportunities to work as part of a research team or one-on-one with a faculty mentor. We’ll help you identify, apply for and coordinate internal and external sources of research funding. Your professors can also help connect you with research-related internships, cross-cultural courses, service projects and summer research opportunities.
Ultimately, we want you to be able to share the excitement, inspiration and relevance of your work and ideas. All of Messiah’s academic departments provide annual symposiums where you can publicly present your research. Or if you’re a student in the arts, we provide a variety of venues where you can showcase your original works and performances. You may even be one of the many Messiah students who co-publish research with faculty or present your research at a national conference or symposium.
Messiah’s strong emphasis on professional research skills, methodology, publication and presentation makes you particularly well prepared for graduate school and in demand by employers.
Changing the world one research
project at a time:
View, listen and read the stories below as Messiah students and faculty members share the incredible learning, experiences and outcomes of their own research projects.
Continue Exploring
Learn more about Undergraduate Research Experiential Learning Initiative Collaboratory for Strategic Partnerships and Applied Research Humanities Fellows Projects Science, Engineering and Health research scholarships Research in Business, Education and Social Sciences Student research from Health, Nutrition and Exercise Science Off-campus summer research opportunities in Chemistry and Biochemistry