Cornell University Funding Links Undergraduates to Sustainability Research Opportunities

Undergraduate students will have the opportunity to conduct summer research in one of four faculty-led projects funded by the Cornell Atkinson Center for Sustainability. Projects will explore livestock herding practices in Mongolia, remote sensing of the melting Greenland Ice Sheet, impacts of environmental warming on brook trout in New York and health outcomes for dairy cows and their calves.

The projects are funded by Atkinson’s Summer Undergraduate Mentored Research Grants, through which two undergraduates are mentored by a graduate student and a faculty principal investigator. The program seeks to support sustainability outcomes while providing students with immersive, collaborative research experiences. It launched successfully in summer 2023: All of the undergraduate students who participated in last year’s summer cohort presented their work at local or national research conferences, and some will be co-authors on peer-reviewed papers, said Beth Fox, director of student and postdoctoral programs for Cornell Atkinson.

“For undergraduates, mentored research is the gold standard for preparation for graduate school and other careers,” Fox said. “True to Cornell Atkinson’s goal of using seed grants to fertilize follow-on funding, two of our students also received further funding to continue their research.”