Undergraduate symposium to celebrate achievement

With projects ranging from the wording of drunk-driving regulations to helping single mothers cope with homelessness to cell imaging to conducting research on a major threat to Wisconsin’s apple crop, students at UW–Madison will showcase their work during the university’s fifth annual Undergraduate Symposium on Tuesday, April 22.

Begun in 1999 as a venue for teaching and learning for the university’s sesquicentennial, the Undergraduate Symposium has become a favorite destination for the projects of Wisconsin Idea Fellows, Undergraduate Research Scholars, Hilldale/Holstrom Fellows and McNair Scholars.

Virginia Sapiro, UW–Madison vice chancellor for teaching and learning, says this year’s event will be the biggest, with nearly 200 projects representing the work of more than 250 students. Sapiro, the Sophonisba Breckinridge Professor of Political Science and Women’s Studies, says the 2003 symposium also will display the diversity of the projects, and illustrate their critical role in undergraduate education.

Students conducting original research or creative projects work with faculty mentors. Sapiro has served in this capacity for several years, and says it has proved rewarding and often moving, since many of the students’ projects have a service-learning component that takes the undergraduates out into the larger community. For example, the fifth-grade girls participating in political science seniors Ifeyinwa Offor and Manya Qadir’s “My Voice” program gain a deeper understanding — and firsthand knowledge — of how crucial reading and writing are to their futures.

“”My Voice’ is designed to provide girls with an emotionally supportive space to find the awareness, curiosity and wisdom that young woman so often are socialized to suppress,” says Offor, who also is majoring in legal studies.

Meeting after school at Schenk Elementary, the 12 students in the club create weekly journals and bimonthly newsletters. They also read books, visit the UW–Madison campus and engage in community service.

“This project will enhance young girls’ self-image and ability to look with excitement toward the future,” Offor says.

“My Voice” certainly seems to be fulfilling its mission, says Sheila Briggs, Schenk’s principal. She says club members not only sharpen communication skills, but also learn about themselves and each other.

“They’re a real mix of girls, including some of the unpopular, disenfranchised students. It’s become a little community. They not only write about their feelings and ideas, they talk about them. One of the books they were reading was called “Loser,’ and the students explored how it feels to be called names or excluded from a group. The questions they asked were really complex and probing — I was very impressed,” Briggs says.