Newswise — Washington, DC- Dr. Mary Crowe, Director of the Office of Undergraduate Research at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, has been elected to serve as the Council on Undergraduate Research (CUR) President-elect for the 2011-2012 year. CUR, with its 600 institutional members and more than 6500 individual members, supports faculty development for high-quality undergraduate student-faculty collaborative research and scholarship.

Crowe has been actively involved with CUR for the past 15 years, participating in and facilitating workshops designed to increase the undergraduate research capacities of institutions across the nation. Most recently she and her colleagues helped CUR develop a new faculty development institute and division for Undergraduate Research Program Directors. Crowe plans to work with CUR members, Councilors, its Executive board and the National Office to “encourage the involvement of the diverse voices of those undertaking, increasing, and improving the quality of undergraduate research opportunities for students across our nation’s institutions of higher education.”

Earlier this month, at the close of the 2011 National Conference, Dr. Crowe began a one year term as CUR President-elect, which will be followed by a year as President and a year as Past-President.

Dr. Mary Crowe holds a BS (Eureka College) and MS and PhD (Northern Illinois University), all in biology. She was a tenured faculty member at Coastal Carolina University from 1994-2004, Director of Xavier University of Louisiana’s Center for Undergraduate Research from 2004-2006 and has been in her current position at UNCG since 2006.

Council on Undergraduate Research: The Council on Undergraduate Research (www.cur.org) supports faculty development for high-quality undergraduate student-faculty collaborative research and scholarship. 600 institutions and over 6500 individuals belong to CUR. CUR believes that the best way to capture student interest and create enthusiasm for a discipline is through research in close collaboration with faculty members.