Six SIS undergraduate researchers represented AU and SIS at the 2026 National Conference on Undergraduate Research (NCUR) held April 13-15 in Richmond, VA.The six students and their projects were:

• Melia Klingler: “Political Polarization in the Christian Church” (Faculty Advisor: Prof. Patrick Thaddeus Jackson)
• Shirley Lin: “Two Thresholds, One Deal: How Post-Brexit Merger Control Shapes UK–EU M&A Financing” (Faculty Mentor: Prof. Jennifer Poole)
• Silvia Postigo: “Modeling Economic Warfare: A Game Theoretical Analysis of the U.S.–China Trade War” (Faculty Mentor: Prof. Dave Ohls)
• Natalie Putz: “The State Beneath the Skin: Tattoos as Uncensored Testimony in Russian Prisons” (Faculty Mentor: Dr. Anders Hardig)
• George Stefanov: “Building a Nuclear Future on a Radioactive Ground: The Evolution of the Kazakhstani Government's Nuclear Narratives” (Faculty Mentor: Prof. Sharon Weiner)
• Hannah Tverberg: “Shaping a System: Understanding Water Management in Chile and Argentina” (Faculty Mentor: Prof. Victoria Kiechel)

For delegate George Stefanov, attending NCUR was valuable not only for presenting his own work, but also learning from other student researchers.

“The conference provided a unique experience to see what students in other fields are working on—I watched presentations ranging from archeological fieldwork to film production,” Stefanov says. “Their research processes and experiences are a lot different from what we do in SIS.” 

Aaron Boesenecker, Assistant Professor at SIS and the SIS Undergraduate Research Coordinator, believes the experience at NCUR is empowering for students because they have the opportunity to converse with other audience members after their presentations to discuss their research, and to pursue publication opportunities for their work.

“Students come away with the realization that their research attracted the curiosity of others, that they really are experts in their topic areas, and that all of the hard work put in to prepare for NCUR at our meetings and practice sessions really paid off,” he says.

Each student delegate took part in a series of preparation workshops over the spring semester to prepare them for participation in a national-level academic conference, which Boesenecker believes speaks to the commitment of each student to producing the best possible research project and to representing SIS and AU at NCUR.

“Our SIS students are consistently among the best-prepared for NCUR, and I think this is reflective of the overall commitment that SIS has to undergraduate research, both in our curriculum and in the opportunities that we provide to students beyond the curriculum—both areas in which we are truly leaders among undergraduate programs and institutions,” Boesenecker says.