EWU draws national research event

Undergraduate conference to bring over 3,700 participants to campus April 16-18

 

Last updated 2/26/2015 at 3:54pm



By PAUL DELANEY

Staff Reporter

Come mid-April, don’t think your calendar is out of sync when the Eastern Washington University campus is buzzing with activity like a fall football weekend.

The uptick in visitors will be due to the National Conference on Undergraduate Research (NCUR) which EWU will host April 16-18. The event will draw an estimated 3,700 participants including students and their leaders.

NCUR will take place at Eastern for the first time and has never before been staged in the state of Washington.

“This is only the eighth time it’s been out West, it’s never been in Washington before,” Chris Robbins, NCUR project manager said. Previously it’s been held in California a couple of times, Utah and in Missoula at the University of Montana. NCUR has been staged for 29 years.

Participants will be coming from 390-plus universities as well as at least a half-dozen countries, so it has an international flavor.

Without doing research, Robbins suggested this might be the largest academic event ever held at EWU. Activities will take place at dozens of locations across campus, from the largest facilities like the Phase and University Rec Center to Paterson Hall, Senior Hall and others.

Lecture halls and other buildings and rooms will be home to the performance and art presentations.

“(We will use) very much the majority of the campus,” Lindsey Porter, symposium coordinator said.

So far planning has gone well, Robbins said. The hotel planning and transportation have been the biggest challenges. The estimated economic impact for this group is $5.4 million according to Tim Robinson of Visit Spokane.

“It energized a lot of the state,” Robbins said, noting that just about every four-year institution in the state are sending participants. “They’ve all got students coming.”

Knowing the value of the forum to allow students to be on a stage like this, Eastern has sent more students than anyone of other NCUR conferences.

NCUR is designed to accomplish a number of goals for participants. It helps cement connections with both other higher education institutions and for future employment.

“We will have job fairs and graduate fairs occurring at the conference,” Porter said. “We definitely encourage further research, further development.”

Eastern has been sending students to NCUR since 2007 and got the notion, “Why don’t we try this?” Robbins said. Working in conjunction with Visit Spokane, the bid was submitted in October 2012.

“What really makes NCUR different from many other conferences is it’s held on campus,” Robbins said. Typically such events are held in convention centers and solely at big hotels.

It’s the perfect fit, Robbins said, because of the availability to use classrooms for so much of the events.

“Eastern had been kicking around the idea for a while, but with support from provost Rex Fuller, it all fell into place,” Robbins added.

In addition to the national conference, Eastern will also stage its traditional Undergrad Symposium, an event that started in 1997.

Normally happening in mid-May, the symposium was pushed forward a month to coincide with NCUR. The 2014 symposium attracted 563 participants who made nearly 350 presentations. Presenters will come from as far away as Great Britain, Porter said.

“You can go see any type of presentation,” Porter explained. “(You will be able to) see what you are interested in, but also other disciplines, too.”

Paul Delaney can be reached at pdelaney@cheneyfreepress.com.

 

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