Blake Muse | Contributor

As I’m sure many of my fellow students know, the EURECA undergraduate research project is making an appearance on campus as part of the Quality Enhancement Program, but what many students might not know what EURECA is.

Basically the program allows students to develop a research project that they would like to research in their areas of study. After developing a proposal and research question that you hope the research will answer, you can submit it to EURECA, and if they like it, the project will fund your study with $1,000.

For example, I have proposed a series of case studies to explore environmental factors that lead to the repetitive cycle of child abuse.

My research question was, “Does living in rural, northwest Texas where most people have strong family values, Baptist backgrounds, and are fiercely independent allow the abusive cycle to continue to the next generation?”

Say there’s a young man who grows up with a physically abusive father or mother. Studies show that the young man is likely to develop abusive tendencies towards his children—but why didn’t he break the cycle?

It could it be because no one in the family sought outside help. Family issues should be handled within the family. It is not anyone else’s business how you raise your kids.

Bible verses like “spare the rod and spoil the child” and “honor thy mother and father” might also lean towards a mindset that they can’t talk to “outsiders” about seeking help.

Then there are children that reach adulthood and don’t abuse their children–but why don’t they? What event or thought process occurred to cause them to stop?

I will conduct a series of case studies that explore into individual’s lives, and motives to see if there is an answer, even on a microscopic scale. If the results match my hypothesis I can then suggest further research on a larger scale.

The importance of all this could depend on what kind of project the student does, his or her passions and belief systems, motives for study, and biases. I do think it’s important to try to understand the world around us. That is why I want to do a research project.

My personal interests lie in socio-cultural equality and fixing the problems humans put each other through.  If no one ever did research on an important topic, no new knowledge would come to our attention. This is of course extremely important to our progression as a race and as a society.

Students should pick something that interests them for research so that way they will stick to it and see it all the way through the publication process. That’s why people do this— we want to add to the scholarly resources.

It also looks good on a resume when you graduate and you’re trying to make yourself stand out from the sea of competition.

At any rate, I would encourage students to participate in this incredible opportunity to work with their peers and the faculty to maybe make some new friends and better understand an area of interest.