KINGSTON, R.I. – October 16 – Over the summer, twenty URI students across a variety of departments participated in The College of Arts and Sciences Fellows Program. The program is a summer research opportunity that allows undergraduates to participate in research, scholarly, and creative projects under the supervision of a university faculty mentor.

To kick off the fall semester, twenty student fellows presented their research in the Memorial Union Atrium. The projects demonstrated the creative freedom and exploration of theories of each students’ area of interest. From artists to scientists, the invaluable experience of immersing themselves into their research, with the guidance of expert faculty, contributes to their career paths.

David LeClair, art and environmental education double-major, took a multimedia approach to his creative project, graphic novel “Moon! Moon!” Growing up in New England, LeClair was influenced by the East Coast landscape. All of the settings in his story draw inspiration from the nature found in New England, in what he calls a “love letter to the natural world.”

LeClair developed the world of “Moon! Moon!” through storyboarding, writing a script, and designing characters and graphics. The project also stretched LeClair’s skills beyond his preferred medium, watercolor, and into animation – which he self-taught.

“I’m really able to express the vision through my preferred media, which is watercolor, but I don’t feel like it’s quite complete without actually seeing emotions and adding in sounds,” said LeClair. “I feel like that would really make it feel like a complete story to me. An animatic basically just acts as a moving story, so I was able to set it to music and finally see that vision in motion.”

Physics and applied math major, Morgan Beck, used physics-modeled machine learning to model equations describing the orbital dynamics of binary black hole systems in her project, “Gravity’s Final Waltz: AI and Black Hole Mergers.” Beck began this project in the spring of 2025, and after securing her fellowship, she continued her research over the summer. 

“I like using scientific computing to assist with my physics and math research,” said Beck. “I took courses with my supervisors who are in the field and based on my interests, they invited me on board this summer to assist with their black hole research.”

Beck plans to continue her research throughout the current academic year. This point in her research, a proof of concept is complete and she will continue to work on extending the model she’s creating into a complex system.

In the political science space, two student fellows, Maeve Murphy and Violet Kelley, participated in The Rhode Island Survey Initiative. A team of researchers released its third annual report in September with this year’s focus on housing. Their work gained first-page coverage in the Providence Journal and The Boston Globe.”

“We found that most polling conducted in Rhode Island is based on elections and government approval ratings,” said Murphy. “It’s not really based on what Rhode Islanders truly want to see change.”

Murphy and Kelley met with topic experts such as Rhode Island Housing and the Homeless Coalition to gain insight from different perspectives in order to create the survey. 93% of people said that housing was an issue in Rhode Island, but tended to disapprove of affordable housing in their own neighborhoods or towns. Homeless centers, however, saw no pushback.

“We found that a lot of people have strong opinions about political housing, but not a lot of people have a full understanding of what affordable housing is and who qualifies for it,” said Kelley. “So we wanted to gauge if there are ways where we could frame affordable housing to change people’s perspectives on it?”

The team plans to further their work on the The Rhode Island Survey Initiative by co-authoring a paper on their findings as well as submit their data to conferences.

“If people had a better grasp on what affordable housing is, I think that generally, we would see a lot more support for it,” said Kelley. “This would benefit people like recent college graduates who…a lot of them could qualify for affordable housing. The local government is so important, if you go to these local government meetings and you make your voice heard, I think it’s a good way to get a better understanding.”

The College of Arts and Sciences Fellows Program offers undergraduates a paid 10-week summer fellowship in which they participate in research, scholarly, or creative projects under the supervision of a faculty mentor. Fellows will be paid and expected to work up to 20 hours per week; although not required, fellows may also receive credit for a directed study, or a personalized academic course where a student undertakes an independent project under the close supervision of a faculty member.

Learn more about eligibility and student fellow profiles, please visit https://web.uri.edu/artsci/fellows-program/. 

This story was written by Erin Malinn, journalism, class of 2028