Written by Niamh Lindberg Stevens:
The Undergraduate Scholars Programme (USP) has been one of the most exciting and rewarding experiences that I have had the chance to take part in during my degree. When I discovered the programme, I was surprised to see how different it was from the other opportunities available at university, which was why I was so keen to get involved. The USP features a range of potential projects for students to take part in, from AI and sustainability to translation and linguistics. Each project involves a group of students conducting research into the subject area and is largely self-directed by the student researchers, with the supervision of an academic who is an expert in the field. Over a period of four months, I took part in the project ‘Anti-Democracy Grifters: Mapping US Influencers Selling Russian State Propaganda’ with nine other students, supervised by Dr Ashley Matthias. Although the decision was a tricky one, with there being a wealth of interesting projects available, I chose this one as it was something more contemporary and political that I wouldn’t usually have the chance to cover in my History degree. As well as being a chance to learn about a new topic and discover more about research, I have also gained a host of new skills through the USP, boosting my employability.
Our project began in February 2025, when everyone participating in the USP was invited to a welcome talk (with refreshments provided!) that served to kick off our projects, introduce us to our group mates and project leads, and generate excitement. We were also given a presentation by the Careers Service, tailored to the USP, focusing on how we could utilise this experience in future applications. Although the free cupcakes and coffee were definitely a highlight, the careers talk was my favourite part of the event – it showed me how the USP and the skills I was due to learn would actually be of real value in upcoming applications, rather than just being an irrelevant addition to my CV.
Our project quickly got underway with a series of training sessions delivered by our amazing project lead, Dr Ashley Matthias. Each project involved a different skillset – one reason I wanted to take part in Anti-Democracy Grifters was because it was focused on media and digital skills, something that as a humanities student I was sorely lacking. Ashley showed us how to set up burner email and social media accounts and use VPNs so that we could safely access content without our activity being traced back to us. This was vital as we would be engaging with parts of the digital world that intersected with extremist circles; Ashley also delivered a very reassuring and useful session on researcher safety and ethics. We were able to work remotely as a group via Microsoft Teams, where we stored all our resources and data. Finally, we collated our data into Excel spreadsheets and learnt how to draw findings from these by assigning codes and creating graphs. The USP has been a great way of familiarizing myself more with these platforms and the digital world in a safe and encouraging environment, where no prior knowledge is expected.
The USP has also been incredibly valuable in enabling me to develop a variety of soft skills. This was the first time I experienced working collaboratively on a project outside of my usual university work, and really gave me an insight into team management, delegation, and communication. Since completing the USP, I have taken on a remote internship and have found that working as a team on the USP definitely helped me get to grips with work norms and communication expectations a lot faster than I would have without that experience. In a similar vein, the USP has improved my time management and organizational skills. Being part of a large and enthusiastic group, I found the USP workload very manageable, but I still learned how to schedule more effectively and juggle this additional project alongside uni work.
At the end of an engaging and interesting four months of training, research, and collaboration, the programme concluded with a celebration afternoon where each group presented their findings. It was fascinating to learn about other students’ projects and see the fruits of all the work they had put in behind the scenes, and it was a really enjoyable afternoon of everyone sharing their passion for research and their project specialism. Putting together our findings into our presentation was a very satisfying moment for our team, and the opportunity to present in front of students and faculty members was excellent public speaking practice and a rewarding experience. The afternoon concluded with the presentation of certificates to each group, and more complimentary refreshments!
Overall, the Undergraduate Scholars Programme has been a great experience, giving me valuable insight into the world of research. In addition to being able to learn about an interesting topic outside of my usual scope of study, the project gave me the chance to connect with other students from a range of subjects, and taught me valuable skills. These skills – teamwork, communication, digital skills, and research protocol – are all transferable and will be of use to me in the rest of my studies and in my career, whether or not that be research-related.
