Student Resources and Awards

These funds are designed to promote collaborative projects between undergraduate students and faculty/ staff mentors. Awards support undergraduate scholarly activities, research, and creative endeavors across all academic programs. Because FGCU privileges Boyer's (1990) modes of scholarship to include discovery, integration, application, and teaching, projects that include any of these facets are especially welcome. We also value student professional development in research and the grant writing process, which we engage through our grant review and submission process that includes the opportunity for students to resubmit.

Grant Review Process:

• Please submit applications at least 30 days before support is needed. For international travel, please submit at least 60 days before travel dates.   
• An initial decision will be made after the proposal is reviewed by the FGCUScholars Leadership Team between 7-10 days after it is received.
• Initial decision will either be: Supported or Rejected.
• Depending on Status:
  • Supported proposals will receive confirmation email and grant details.
  • Rejected proposals may have the opportunity to resubmit.
    • The student and faculty mentor will be contacted by the Office of Undergraduate Scholarship with an evaluation of the proposal and suggestions for improvement for resubmission. This is a required part of the grant drafting and learning process.
    • Please have the student email the resubmission to the Office of Undergraduate Scholarship email (ous@fgcu.edu) with the Faculty Mentor cc’d on the email.
    • Final grant decisions are pending the submission of the revised grant proposal and final review by the FGCUScholars team. Only 1 resubmission will be accepted.
• Distribution of Awarded Funds:
  • Contact the OUS Office (ous@fgcu.edu) or the grant coordinator (jchastain@fgcu.edu) to determine how funds will be distributed.
  • For travel, you must contact OUS and file the necessary travel documentation at least 7 days before traveling, otherwise we cannot distribute funds. Feel free to visit our office in Edwards Hall 214.
  • Research trips require a community presentation or symposium as part of the data collection.

Submissions: Rolling deadline – submit at least 30 days before support is needed. Travel funding requests submitted within 7 business days of travel dates will not be considered. 

Award: $50 - $1,000

Eligibility: All FGCU full-time undergraduate students in collaboration with a faculty/ staff mentor are eligible to apply for this initiative. At least one undergraduate student and the mentoring faculty/ staff must jointly submit the application.
Mentoring Faculty/Staff: If you have multiple students working on the same or overlapping project(s) that will need the same materials, please submit only one application. If your student(s) received a grant for travel purposes, you may also be eligible for a small stipend to accompany them.
For Conference or Research Travel involving multiple students: We encourage students traveling to the same location for a conference to combine their expenses in one application and plan on traveling together. Feel free to reach out for assistance if we can help you develop the proposal

WiSER Eagles (Work-study in Scholarly Experiential Research) is a program in which undergraduate students work with faculty on a scholarly project and participate in weekly professional development opportunities, including meetings and activities organized by the Office of Undergraduate Scholarship and FGCUScholars. By the end of the last semester worked, students must submit a short report describing their experience and will present their scholarship at an on-campus forum. Workers in this program must be eligible for Federal Work-Study to be hired.

The LA program promotes partnerships in active-learning classrooms that enhance student learning through inquiry, improving student success and skill development. Participating faculty and LA undergraduates complete experiences that develop pedagogy skills and active-learning strategies.

Learn More

The Communities in Transition initiative supports faculty-student-community member partnerships in a way that creates rich and meaningful research and service opportunities, and allows FGCU to take a leadership role in statewide and region-wide enhancement or advancement efforts. Proposals should be focused to Southwest Florida and the Caribbean region. 

Faculty teams are invited to submit community-engaged research proposals that will undertake site-based research during the summer semester. Each project may comprise between 1-3 faculty. Faculty Project Leaders will work with supporting offices to select up to 6 students that may participate in this community-engaged research. 

Projects may come from any academic discipline, and interdisciplinary collaborations are encouraged. Eligible research projects may explore not just the impact of change or disturbance, but may also document how communities respond to transitionary events. All projects must design and embed meaningful and sustainable service initiatives within their project so that supported faculty and student scholars help natural and human communities in these locations.