Last week, three master’s students in Education Policy, Organization and Leadership received awards at the Ethnography of the University Initiative (EUI) conference, supported by the University Library. Part of an expansive undergraduate research program at the University of Illinois, the EUI focuses on social science and humanities research.

Third year law student, Theresa Rocha Beardall, and Education graduate student Dean Choi participated with a collaborative project in this semester’s University Library’s EUI poster contest. Beardall, (J.D. Candidate, Class of 2014) and Choi presented the poster, “First in My Family: Student Loan Debt and Personal Happiness Among First-Generation Students at Illinois,” showing the importance of first-generation student experiences at the University of Illinois, where 23-percent of the incoming freshman class identify as a first-generation student.

Five posters were submitted this semester and judged on a rubric created by the Library’s User Education Committee. The winners received a $25 gift card to the Illini Union Bookstore.

Nick Melrose and Siew Szetho were awarded the EUI graduate student presentation award for their oral presentation, “Parkland Pathways: A Comparative Evaluation of Transfer Students from Illinois Community Colleges to the University of Illinois.”

EUI will be launching its inaugural undergraduate research journal, Peer Review: The Undergraduate Research Journal of the Ethnography of the University Initiative, in spring 2014.