The Undergraduate Research, Creativity and Innovation Festival is accepting abstracts until Friday.

The URCI festival is an event for students to broadcast their projects and research. It will be for ACU students, but also for students from surrounding universities  and will take place on April 11 at the Hunter Welcome Center.

These projects are offered in multiple ways which include oral presentations, displays and performances. The festival organizers are encouraging students from all departments to submit and present their work.

“I expect to continue increasing the amount of arts: performance arts and visual arts in the festival,” said Dr. Joshua Brokaw, former faculty director, a committee member and a professor of biology.

The festival tends to have more submissions in the social sciences, science and engineering, but the festival organizers are pushing for more of the arts. The committee and director have made an effort to reach out to these departments to show that they can participate in this festival.

“All areas are important, and I will be thrilled to have great representation from across the campus,” said Dr. Dan Morrison, the faculty director for undergraduate research, creativity and innovation.

In addition to reaching out to departments, the committee and director are trying to have a live painting during the festival. This live painting will show what the creative process looks like. This will help bring students to the festival and help this festival stand out from the past events.

The committee is pushing for more abstracts than in past years. In 2021, 95 abstracts were submitted from ACU and other universities. In 2022, 112 abstracts were submitted. Also, the committee hopes to receive more abstracts from outside universities this year.

Abstracts are due Friday. After the abstracts are turned in, they are reviewed by the faculty committee to determine whether it will be presented in the festival. The students will be notified of their presentation acceptance. With this acceptance, the students and their faculty mentors are asked to prepare and finalize these presentations for the festival.

A few more deadlines for the festival include:

• Registration Portal opens on Feb. 20 and closes on March 10
• Presentation Submissions open March 20 and close on April 7

“When I go to a conference and present work, there is nothing better than a few friendly faces in the audience to focus on,” said Morrison, associate professor of sociology.

The festival invites undergraduate students from all departments to present their work. Students that are not participating are encouraged to register for the event to support the students presenting and to view their work. If it conflicts with a class, students can register and receive a university approved absence.