Finding Faculty Mentors

Penn does not have a research job placement service or a research match-making program. Each student must first clarify in what area of expertise she/he seeks a mentor, then investigate researchers in that area to find those whose current research interests best match the student's topic. Finally, the student must approach, and, in some cases, persuade the researcher to take on the student.

Places online to look:

• Provost's Undergraduate Research Mentoring Program
• Research Centers and Institutes lists all the research centers at Penn including in its related hospitals.
• By Penn school:
  • Arts and Sciences faculty list (A-Z) links to faculty in Arts and Sciences.
    Department pages may provide better browsing. There are frequently pages titled "Faculty and Research" or "People."
  • Engineering and Applied Science faculty lists are available either alphabetically or by department.
    Department listings will also describe faculty projects and centers under the tab "Research".
  • School of Nursing has a list of Research Centers.
    It also produces a listing of a research opportunities for students.
  • Wharton faculty listing (either alphabetically or by department), and Wharton Centers and Initiatives
• Research Directory for Undergraduates
• The Work-Study job listing from the Student Employment Office. Student research can be paid through the Federal Work-Study program if the student has a Work-Study grant. Students who do not have grants will still be able to find faculty researchers who are looking for students to hire. Not all will be able to fund non-work-study students but some will. Searching under "category" = "research" yields the best results.

People to talk to for further introductions:

• Undergraduate Student Associations
• Undergraduate department chairs or advisors
• Often faculty a student knows from an introductory (or higher-level) course are a good starting point. They will know what that student is capable of and will be more willing to exert themselves for a good student.
• College House deans and faculty fellows
• Graduate students
• Van Pelt library has subject experts with whom students can schedule hour-long advising meetings. They are most useful in narrowing and defining a research project/topic. A project will still require a mentor who is on the faculty, but library subject experts can get a student and her/his project into ready-to-go condition for approaching a very busy potential faculty mentor.

Center for Undergraduate Research and Fellowships
The ARCH, 3601 Locust Walk
University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA 19104-6224
215-746-6488
curf@pobox.upenn.edu