Annual Undergraduate Research Symposium
The annual CCU Undergraduate Research Symposium is held in April of each year. The Symposium celebrates the accomplishments of CCU undergraduate researchers and provides a venue for the dissemination of student research. Undergraduate research includes original research and scholarly or creative works, so all disciplines are represented. All CCU undergraduate researchers are eligible and encouraged to submit abstracts to present research that they completed during the previous year. Student presenters can also choose to participate in the Undergraduate Research Competition, in which presentations are judged within broad disciplinary categories and the top presentations in multiple disciplinary categories win cash awards.
2024 Annual CCU Undergraduate Research Symposium
April 10-11, 2024
Download: 2024 Undergraduate Research Symposium Program
Download: 2024 Undergraduate Research Symposium Abstracts
Symposium Schedule
Wednesday, April 10, 2024
- 12:00-2:00 pm Poster Presentations – Lib Jackson Student Union Atrium
- 2:00-5:00 pm Oral Presentations – Lib Jackson Student Union (see program for schedule)
Thursday, April 11, 2024
- 12:00-3:00 pm Oral Presentations – Lib Jackson Student Union (see program for schedule)
- 3:00-5:00 pm Poster Presentations – Lib Jackson Student Union Atrium
Instructions for Presenters
View Competition Programs, Abstracts, and Winners from Previous Years
Presentation Authorship: For the purposes of the Undergraduate Research Symposium abstract, the listed presenter should be an undergraduate student who is the primary author of the presentation and the primary investigator/creator for the work being presented. The student is welcome to list the faculty research mentor and any number of individuals as co-authors on the presentation title slide or poster heading, but for the competition abstract, only the lead presenter should be listed. In cases where two or more students have contributed equally to a project and wish to co-present together, more than one name can be listed on the abstract as presenters. Please be aware that if a group presentation wins an award, there is only one award for the entire group.
Oral Presentations: Oral presentations are scheduled every 20 minutes. Presentation length should be about 12 minutes long, leaving adequate time for questions and transitions between talks. Rooms will include a laptop with PowerPoint software, projector and screen. Presenters should bring their PowerPoint presentations on a USB thumb drive and will have a minute or two to load their presentations immediately before presenting. The laptops will be Windows-based, so if you build your presentation on a Mac, you should review your presentation on a Windows-based computer to check your formatting.
Poster Presentations: Posters will be displayed during two or more designated poster sessions, each two hours in length. Poster presenters must attend their designated poster session throughout their poster session and will present their posters during that period. Judges and students will circulate during the poster session to visit posters and to judge those that are participating in the competition. Poster easels and poster boards with clips/pins will be supplied for the poster session. You will be responsible for putting up and taking down your poster at the appointed times. Posters should be a maximum size of 3-feet-by-4 feet in order to mount on the poster boards. If you have made a slightly larger poster that will also be presented at another conference, some creative mounting on your part may accommodate a slightly larger poster, but please contact Pat Taylor (patt@coastal.edu) for anything substantially larger (oversized posters may not be eligible for an award, but we will make every effort to display it). Students or faculty mentors/departments are responsible for any costs associated with producing the posters.
Judging of Presentations
Rubric for Judging Oral Presentations (PDF)
Rubric for Judging Poster Presentations (PDF)
Presentations that are participating in the competition will be judged by at least three faculty judges. The judges are all volunteers with scheduling issues of their own, so it is logistically impossible to have the same judges for all presentations or to always match up the disciplines of judges and student presenters. A system is in place to identify outliers (judges who consistently score too high or too low) and adjust the scores accordingly for the final awards. You should expect to have one judge from your discipline or a related discipline and one judge who is not from your discipline (often not even your college). Audience members are likely to be from diverse backgrounds, as well. Therefore, you should plan your presentation to reach a broadly intelligent general audience, but not necessarily specialists in your field. In your presentation, do not shy away from the specific terminology and potentially complex concepts of your field, but recognize that you may need to provide some background or additional explanation as needed. You should review the presentation scoring rubrics above when preparing your presentation. The judges will score each category, so be sure you have addressed all of them. The judges know that different disciplines place varying levels of significance on different rubric categories, and they are instructed to adjust their expectations according to discipline. For example, the Methodology/Strategy portion of an English senior thesis presentation might be very short compared to the same section for a psychology presentation with extensive experimental designs and protocols, and that is appropriate. One of the categories for oral presentations is "Answers to Questions." The judges have been instructed to ask questions if no one else does; however, if your presentation goes long and does not leave time for questions, you will not get points in that category.
Contact Us
Office for Undergraduate Research
Coastal Science Center, Rm 160P
843-349-2616
Aneilya Barnes
Director of Undergraduate Research
843-349-2525
abarnes@coastal.edu
Pat Taylor
Undergraduate Research Assistant
843-349-2616
patt@coastal.edu
Rob Young
Associate Provost for Research
843-349-2277
ryoung@coastal.edu