Student/Faculty Agreement for Volunteer Research

Body

The following are guidelines on Volunteer Research. The full College of Engineering Policy for Undergraduate Research can be viewed here

Undergraduate research experiences are valuable for our students and an excellent venue to showcase activities and mentor students who are considering graduate studies. Students shall be appropriately compensated for their work and expectations must be appropriate for the scope of work they are undertaking. In some instances, students may want to get a feel for what a research position would entail but not be ready to commit to a larger role or may want to shadow a student doing research to learn about a project. These volunteer roles are not appropriate where the student is being tasked to provide research products or deliverables. Such positions should be limited in scope and total hours and should typically not extend beyond one semester or summer, though specific details may vary based on agreements between the student and supervisor. These are not renewable and shall not be used sequentially as rotations through different laboratories or different projects in a particular faculty group.  

This option should be initiated by student preference and non-committal to regular hours. Any research opportunity involving significant hours of continuing work that is used to evaluate independent research aptitude before committing to a larger project should be an hourly paid or academic credit undergraduate research opportunity. Undergraduate students engaging in such volunteer research activities must execute the volunteer research agreement form with the supervising faculty member prior to starting the activity.  Download the form using the link provided on this page.