鈥淲e鈥檙e excited to launch Elon Collect because it gives us a shared digital home for the intellectual and cultural life of the university,鈥� states Dean & University Librarian of Carol Grotnes Belk Library Brian Mathews. 鈥淚t will preserve important pieces of Elon鈥檚 institutional history while also providing lasting access to faculty and student scholarship, creative work, research, reports, teaching materials and other significant contributions. In that sense, it is both an archive of where Elon has been and an infrastructure for where we are going.鈥�

What is Elon Collect?

Elon Collect is an institutional repository, which is a digital system that is used to disseminate scholarly works created at a single institution. However, Elon Collect鈥檚 scope expands more broadly, allowing data and archival materials to stand in conversation with scholarship.

Elon Collect is home to three distinct overarching collections: Elon Works, Elon Data, and University Archives & Special Collections.

• Elon Works is a centralized hub to showcase the research, scholarly, creative and teaching-focused work created across campus.
• Elon Data is home to data created and collected by students, faculty and staff.
• University Archives & Special Collections is the new location for curated images, documents, and ephemera from Elon, church, and local history from Belk Library’s .

Anyone currently associated with 福利亚洲国产精品 is eligible to deposit works into the Elon Works and Elon Data collections to enhance reach and visibility, both around campus and worldwide.

Elon Collect worked with three campus partners鈥搕he , the , and the Digital and Spatial Humanities Consortium鈥搕o showcase examples of faculty and staff work and ensure a smooth campus launch on Aug. 14. Additionally, posters from the have been included to provide examples of how student work can be shared.

What are the benefits & features of Elon Collect?

鈥淓lon Collect will empower faculty, staff, and students to better disseminate and promote their work, exercise their rights as authors, and contribute to conversations in research, creative practice, and teaching and learning,” said Coordinator of Research and Publishing and Associate Librarian Jesse Akman. “Moreover, Elon Collect will simplify grant compliance, improve discoverability for Elon journals and publications, and strengthen internal communications and institutional memory.鈥�

One of the core goals of Elon Collect is to provide wider access to works created on Elon鈥檚 campus. With Google Scholar indexing, any work deposited can be discovered by researchers worldwide. Through Creative Commons license options, Elon creators can more precisely describe how others may use their work. However, for those who may not want their work to be available worldwide, Elon Collect also provides other access options, including embargos to make public at a later date or internal access to only Elon users.

The system can also mint DOIs, or digital object identifiers, to provide a persistent identifier that acts as a stable, permanent link back to the work. DOIs help to standardize citations, especially for users outside of Elon.

Elon Collect also provides Author Profiles, a centralized portfolio for all works in the repository alongside research interests and external publications. The Author Profiles provide comparative statistics for every work connected to the profile owner, making it even easier to find and share the impact of your work.

鈥淎s we enter the final years of Boldly Elon and consider what it means to “Rise,” Elon Collect will help position the university for a future where our authors’ works are preserved and accessible, their rights are protected, and our campus is more enmeshed in scholarly communications than ever before,鈥� said Akman.

What can I submit to Elon Collect?

Elon Collect accepts a variety of deposits from current faculty, staff and students.

鈥淓lon Collect expands beyond the scope of a traditional institutional repository to capture the full breadth of work being created on campus today,鈥� said Emma Powell, archivist and assistant librarian and manager of Elon Collect. 鈥淗istorically, the 福利亚洲国产精品 Archives and Special Collections has only collected undergraduate honors theses. This is an exciting opportunity to diversify the works we share.鈥�

Works that can be deposited include, but are not limited to:

• Campus-based publications鈥攕erial outputs created and published by campus centers like journals or podcast series
• Conference-based works鈥攚orks like posters or presentations created for or presented at a disciplinary conference
• Creative works鈥攐utputs from those working/studying in creative fields like artwork, choreography, creative writing, filmmaking and original music compositions
• Data, software and code
• Grey literature鈥攄ocuments created to be shared but not be published through traditional means like reports and white papers
• Open publications鈥攚orks that have been formally published like book chapters and journal articles, and have Open Access (OA) or self-archiving (Green OA) options
• Student works鈥攚orks completed solely by students that have original writing or research and should be shared beyond the classroom like theses and capstones or SURF and SURE posters and presentations
• Teaching and learning materials鈥攚orks created for use in the classroom that may be reused and/or adapted by others, like assignments, lectures or other OERs

鈥淢any of our new areas of collecting reflect the university鈥檚 continued growth,鈥� Powell said. 鈥淲e collect teaching and learning materials to reflect the excellence in teaching from our faculty, and allow for a wide range of student work to showcase our expansive undergraduate research. Even our data and code collection connects to the continued work of Data Nexus.鈥�

Submitting your work to Elon Collect only takes three simple steps:

1. Find or create a work that you or the university hold copyrights to and wish to share further.
2. Go to and navigate to the 鈥淪ubmit鈥� header. Select a submission form and provide basic descriptions (also known as metadata) to make your work more discoverable.
3. Submit your form and wait for the repository team to review. Once the team has ensured the work fits into the system scope and has the necessary metadata, your work will be made available in the system.

Questions?

To learn more, join Belk Library on Monday, September 21 at 1 p.m.聽for the first workshop in our Scholars鈥� Toolkit series: Showcasing Your Scholarly and Professional Work in Elon Collect and ORCiD. .

For further information, visit or email elon-collect@elon.edu.

Olivia Guarino 鈥�26, Ella McGlynn 鈥�26, Anna Grace Gilbert 鈥�27 and Jessica Garcia-Bastida 鈥�27 presented their research at the from July 6-9 in Panam谩 City, Panam谩.聽Attendance at the conference regularly includes over 1,100 attendees and members from various fields such as developmental psychology, cognitive neuroscience, pediatrics and education.

罢丑别听, which is directed by Perkins, focuses on understanding the acquisition of motor skills in infancy (such as crawling and walking), and how they relate to other cognitive and social skills.

Guarino and Garcia-Bastida presented a poster titled, 鈥�’Can you get the toy?: How walking infants use whole-body problem solving during an object retrieval task.” The two have been working on the project over the past year and have contributed meaningfully to data collection appointments with infants and behavioral video coding and analyses.

Gilbert and McGlynn presented a poster titled, “Take a step!: Links between infant play and mother vocalizations as crawling infants learn to walk鈥� and were co-authors on a symposium presentation titled “Tiny hands, big transitions:聽Analyzing crawling infants鈥櫬爐arget interactions during play as聽they learn to walk,” and presented by Perkins. This work is part of an ongoing collaboration with , who is a professor in the Department of Psychology and Neuroscience at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Gilbert has made meaningful contributions to the project for the past two years and presented preliminary findings at a different international conference in Prague, Czech Republic last year. McGlynn鈥檚 contributions spanned the past year in behavioral video coding and analyses.

Student members of the Infant Development Lab benefitted from networking and professional development opportunities at the conference, including meeting authors whose work they had read for literature reviews, group discussions, and lab meetings, and participating in an Undergraduate Networking Session designed to help researchers and students in making valuable connections for employment and/or graduate study. A notable event was the civic reception, which is usually themed based on the conference location. This year鈥檚 reception was on an outdoor terrace and featured dancers and music in culturally traditional attire.

The group also had opportunities between conference sessions to explore Panam谩 City,

Student travel to the conference was supported by the Undergraduate Research Program and the Department of Psychology, and Perkins鈥� travel was supported by Dean鈥檚 Office of Elon College, the College of Arts and Sciences. Mentored students in the Infant Development Lab come from a variety of diverse backgrounds and go on to graduate and professional programs.

Perkins is an active scholar in developmental psychology and mentoring relationships in higher education. Her research has been published in journals such as “Child Development,” “Infancy,” and “Infant Behavior and Development,”聽 “Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Psychology,” the “Journal of First-generation Student Success” and “Perspectives on Undergraduate Research Mentoring.” She is currently working on a co-edited book on mentoring and/as meaningful relationships as a high-impact practice聽published by Routledge, cross-listed in the AAC&U series, and the series on engaged learning and teaching.

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• The Month in Photos: June 2026
• The Month in Photos: May 2026
• The Month in Photos: April 2026

While many students are away for the summer, July remained a busy month at 福利亚洲国产精品. Student researchers shared the results of projects driven by curiosity and purpose, high school students experienced campus through summer programs and the university continued to welcome visitors for camps and community events. Take a look back at some of the month鈥檚 highlights through the eyes of the staff in University Communications.

Elon Engage

The Engage program at Elon provides an opportunity for incoming students to spend a week on campus before their first semester, learning more about the university and volunteering in the local community. It is聽one of Elon鈥檚聽First-Year Summer Experience (FSE)聽programs, which聽gives incoming Elon students a preview of the university during the summer before their first semester

Adventures in Leadership

Another FSE program, Adventures in Leadership, allows incoming first-year students to explore the outdoors across North Carolina.

A combined College Coffee

Elon faculty and staff visited Queens University for a day of collaborative learning, professional development and Queens’ first-ever College Coffee event fostering connection and community between both institutions.

Research together

More than 50 福利亚洲国产精品 and Queens University of Charlotte students came together for the annual Summer Undergraduate Research Experience presentations on July 23 in Schar Hall.

The largest Odyssey

福利亚洲国产精品鈥檚聽Odyssey Program welcomed its largest cohort in history during Odyssey Week, a collection of events that introduces the students to the scholarship program and college life.

Phoenix Summer

福利亚洲国产精品 hosted its inaugural Phoenix Summer residential camp this month for rising high school juniors and seniors interested in preparing for the transition to college.

Twenty-six students participated in Phoenix Summer, held July 6-17 on Elon鈥檚 campus, where they immersed themselves in hands-on, college-style academics while fostering curiosity, community and independence.

Off-the-Court

Seven incoming first-year students explored careers in the sport industry this summer through the Off-the-Court First Year Summer Experience, an immersive program designed to help students discover where they fit in the business of sport before declaring a major.

Led by sport management faculty members Cara Lucia and Khirey Walker, participants toured Elon Athletics facilities, connected with alumni in Charlotte, toured Truist Field, home of the Charlotte Knights, and visited organizations such as the Carolina Core Elite Training Center and the Burlington Sock Puppets, gaining firsthand insight into the many career paths within the sport industry.

Related Articles

• Elon holds largest-ever Spring Undergraduate Research Forum
• Personal experience inspires Elon student鈥檚 research to help children experiencing homelessness

Dozens of students showcased research projects inspired by personal experiences and academic interests, guided by faculty mentorship, during the 2026 Summer Undergraduate Research Experience presentations on July 23 in Schar Hall.

The most recent SURE symposium featured more than 50 students from both 福利亚洲国产精品 and Queens University of Charlotte, marking the latest example of collaboration between two institutions in the process of merging into a united community.

鈥淪URE continues to be one of the flagship events of Elon鈥檚 Undergraduate Research Program. This poster session is a celebration of their dedication and growth as budding young scholars,鈥� said Justin Clar, director of undergraduate research and associate professor of chemistry. 鈥淚 was especially pleased that we were joined by amazing students from Queens who shared their work with the Elon community.鈥�

At Elon, the Summer Undergraduate Research Experience has for years provided student researchers with a stipend to spend eight weeks working full-time on a project in collaboration with a faculty mentor with substantial and recognized expertise in the discipline.

The program concludes every July with a symposium that deepens students鈥� knowledge of the research experience while offering an opportunity to grow their public speaking and presentation skills.

“It was a great opportunity for the students to share their summer research in a low-stakes environment,” said Kira McEntire, director of undergraduate research and creative work; and associate professor of biology at Queens. “It was also fun to see the Elon students sharing their summer projects and to learn about some of the interests of Elon colleagues.”

At Queens, the university holds its annual in the spring, a campus-wide celebration of academic inquiry and community impact. The day starts with oral and poster presentations, followed by service activities in the afternoon.

Personal connections

For many students at SURE, like Elon student聽Thomas Gress 鈥�27, projects carried a deeply personal connection. Gress designed a four-week study comparing exercise approaches for people with chronic fatigue syndrome, inspired in part by his brother鈥檚 experience with the condition.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the condition is a serious and often long-lasting illness that keeps people from doing their usual activities. It makes physical and mental exertion difficult, and symptoms include difficulty thinking, severe tiredness, and other issues.

鈥淏efore I started this project, (my brother had) been suffering for four years, and there seemed to be no end in sight. So, this was something small that I could do to be of use,鈥� said Gress, a biology major from Savannah, Georgia. 鈥淔or all of these patients, there鈥檚 no other option. There are no drugs available, only a few supplements with very little efficacy. So, it seems the best option is experimenting with lifestyle. And if not this, then there is nothing.鈥�

Queens student Isabella Sherman 鈥�27 has a love for nature that inspired her to explore plant communities at the Carolina Wildlands Foundation with mentor E. Davis Carter, assistant professor of biology at Queens.

鈥淚t was an excellent experience,鈥� said Sherman, a conservation biology major from Charlotte. 鈥淚t鈥檚 really close to what I want to do with my career. I love research, I love forestry, and every time I went out there, I was like, 鈥楾his is exactly what I want to do.鈥� This kind of information is what people take into consideration when they鈥檙e trying to develop land or provide an additional environment for fauna and flora.鈥�

Mentoring relationships

A common thread among many of the projects was the close relationship students developed with their faculty mentors.

Anna Grace Gilbert 鈥�27, an Elon psychology major from Knoxville, Tennessee, says Associate Professor of Psychology Sabrina Perkins 鈥渃ompletely changed鈥� her undergraduate experience through their work studying infant motor development.

鈥淚鈥檝e worked with (Professor Perkins) technically since the summer of my freshman year. I just reached out to her and was like, 鈥業 love babies. I鈥檇 love to work with you,鈥� Gilbert said. 鈥淚鈥檓 very grateful. We鈥檝e really bonded over these almost three years.鈥�

For Jack VanValkenburg 鈥�27, a Queens student majoring in data analytics, undergraduate research provided an opportunity to apply his technical skills. He worked with Queens Assistant Professor of Biology Denni Einersson to develop a computerized system for organizing trash collected during community cleanup events.

鈥淚t was a great opportunity to work with people who know more than me. The coding that I鈥檝e done in the past is more analytical and this was more developmental,鈥� said VanValkenburg, who is from Atlanta. 鈥�(Clean-up crews) would go out with field cards, like pencil and paper, and just mark things down, which was super timely and it鈥檚 very inconvenient, and then that just led to a lot of data that wasn鈥檛 being used.”

Pushing through the learning process

Elon business analytics major Chase Hannibal 鈥�28 examined the sense of belonging among Black business students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities and Predominantly White Institutions. It can sometimes feel isolating as a Black female business student, Hannibal said.

鈥淚 just wanted to see if other students felt that way, and if it was a pattern, what could be fixed,鈥� Hannibal said. 鈥�(I wanted to) let other students know that you鈥檙e not alone.鈥�

Hannibal says her mentor, Shanetta Pendleton, assistant professor of strategic communications, pushed her to be better, even when she was at her 鈥渟topping point.鈥�

鈥淓ven when I felt at the worst of the worst, she supported me throughout everything,鈥� Hannibal said. 鈥淪he was great, and I鈥檓 very excited to work with her in the future.鈥�

Amelia Weaver 鈥�28 also explored the experiences of college students, particularly women. Her Elon Honors Fellows research examines the motivations of college-aged women who participate in sports betting after she noticed women were less vocal about the topic in class discussions.

鈥淚t made me think about why the women in the class weren鈥檛 as talkative or excited about their own experiences with sports betting,鈥� said Weaver, a sport management and media analytics double major with a minor in . 鈥淚 wondered if this was because they didn鈥檛 participate, didn鈥檛 care, or they just didn鈥檛 want to say anything.鈥�

Weaver said her mentor, Alex Traugutt, an assistant professor of sport management, has helped guide her through the process.

鈥淗e immediately said, 鈥楾his is going to be a partnership. We鈥檙e going to take steps together. We鈥檙e going to figure this out together. I鈥檓 not just going to throw you into everything,鈥欌�� said Weaver. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 been really helpful in the learning process.鈥�

Students apply to the annual research symposium, which usually takes place during the summer before the junior or senior year. It is one of several opportunities for students to showcase undergraduate research, a cornerstone of the Elon education and one of the five聽Elon Experiences. Students are also able to present scholarly work at the聽Spring Undergraduate Research Forum.

Presentations encompass a variety of topics, including helping teachers work with students facing homelessness, finding therapies for an ‘elusive chronic disease‘ and studying the motivations of women participating in sports betting.聽

There will be two separate poster presentations:

• 9 to 10:15 a.m.
• 10:30 to 11:45 a.m.

The Elon community is invited to attend and learn more about the students鈥� scholarship.

For his first undergraduate research project at Elon, Thomas Gress 鈥�27 is looking to make an impact on people suffering from chronic fatigue syndrome, including his own brother.

鈥淏efore I started this, he鈥檇 been suffering for four years, and there seemed to be no end in sight,鈥� said Gress, a biology major from Savannah, Georgia. 鈥淪o, this was something small that I could do to be of use.鈥�

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) is a serious and often long-lasting illness that keeps people from doing their usual activities. It makes physical and mental exertion difficult, and symptoms include trouble thinking, severe tiredness and other symptoms.

鈥淚t鈥檚 a bit of an elusive chronic disease,鈥� Gress said. 鈥淭here are no pharmacotherapies available and there are no biomarkers for confirmed disease, so all we can do is experiment with lifestyle, and a big part of that is exercise.鈥�

Exercise is the focus of Gress鈥� research, working with Professor of Exercise Science Eric Hall to design a four-week study to compare two different approaches to exercise. Before the study begins, each participant undergoes a walking test to determine their comfortable walking distance. Most participants are expected to walk between 10 and 20 minutes, although no one is expected to walk for more than 45 minutes.

Participants are then divided into two groups: graded exercise therapy and pacing therapy. The study focuses on the concept of an 鈥渆nergy envelope,鈥� a term used to describe the amount of physical activity a person鈥檚 body can comfortably perform. One approach suggests that people may benefit from gradually pushing beyond their usual limits, while the other suggests that people should stay within their comfort zone and adjust activity levels based on how they feel.

During the study, participants use their baseline walking time to set weekly goals. In the first week, they are asked to walk for 80% of their baseline time. This increases to 90% in the second week, 100% in the third week and 110% in the fourth week. However, there is an important difference between the two groups. Participants in the graded exercise therapy group are required to follow this schedule exactly. Participants in the pacing therapy group are encouraged to follow the schedule but have the flexibility to adjust their activity based on their energy levels and personal needs.

Gress will present his research at the Summer Undergraduate Research Experience (SURE) presentations on July 23 in the Snow Family Grand Atrium. Students apply to the annual research symposium, which usually takes place during the summer before the junior or senior year. It is one of several opportunities for students to showcase undergraduate research, a cornerstone of the Elon education and one of the five聽Elon Experiences. Students are also able to present scholarly work at the聽Spring Undergraduate Research Forum.

Gress hopes this research will reveal which approach is more effective at helping participants stay committed to the program and whether either method leads to lower levels of fatigue, hopefully helping people with CFS.

鈥淔or all of these patients, there’s no other option,鈥� Gress said. 鈥淭here are no drugs available, only a few supplements with very little efficacy. So, it seems the best option is experimenting with lifestyle. And if not this, then there is nothing.鈥�

鈥淭he class told us about 鈥榙oubled-up homelessness,鈥� where you鈥檙e living with family or others, and you鈥檙e living under a roof, but it鈥檚 not your home. I had no idea that was a thing,鈥� said Brandon, an elementary education major from Hastings, Michigan.

Now, Brandon is working with Jill McSweeney, assistant director of the Center for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning, and assistant professor of wellness, on a project examining the ways that North Carolina elementary school teachers and homeless liaisons are collaborating to help students experiencing homelessness.

According to Brandon, each North Carolina school district has a homeless education liaison responsible for managing resources, funding and teacher training. Brandon and McSweeney are working with the North Carolina Homeless Education Program to survey and interview teachers across the state to improve the training educators receive on supporting students experiencing homelessness.

鈥淎 liaison can be the best liaison in the whole world, and they can’t be with every student in the district supporting their needs every day and seeing their day-to-day life like a teacher does,鈥� Brandon said. 鈥淏ut in North Carolina and nationwide, most teachers are never trained by their liaison just because there’s not enough time. They have no idea about all the funding that is available to them, and instead they’re spending hundreds of dollars every year out of their own pocket to buy food, clothing and hygiene products.鈥�

Brandon will be presenting her work at the Summer Undergraduate Research Experience (SURE) presentations on July 23 in the Snow Family Grand Atrium. Students apply to the annual research symposium, which usually takes place during the summer before the junior or senior year. It is one of several opportunities for students to showcase undergraduate research, a cornerstone of the Elon education and one of the five Elon Experiences. Students are also able to present scholarly work at the Spring Undergraduate Research Forum.

Working with McSweeney, Brandon says, has been a transformative experience. McSweeney鈥檚 research area focuses on college student experiences on campus and in the classroom, along with a broad focus on teaching and learning. But Brandon says, despite not focusing specifically on K-12 education, McSweeney was excited to work with her.

鈥淚 cannot imagine what my undergraduate experience would be like if Jill McSweeney was not my mentor,鈥� Brandon said. 鈥淪he taught me how to do research because Teaching Fellows are not only expected to do research, but our course schedules are so rigorous that we can’t take a methods course. So, she was helping me with my research, teaching me how to do research, and what research methods were, and also showing me how to navigate higher education as a system.鈥�

As Brandon prepares to graduate next spring, she hopes to continue her education at Elon through the Teach for Alamance program. The Elon scholarship program provides full tuition remission and a small stipend to teacher-candidate graduates of the Dr. Jo Watts Williams School of Education who wish to enroll in聽Elon鈥檚 Master of Education program. This project, she hopes, will also help her future colleagues in the Alamance-Burlington School System.

鈥淚 wanted to make sure that I was doing research that would have an impact that reached the people that it was about and not just the academic community,鈥� Brandon said. 鈥淚 know that I can’t redesign legal systems, and I can鈥檛 fix all of the state鈥檚 problems that are causing homelessness to happen. I wanted to see what the most is that I could do with undergraduate research to make sure that more students are supported.鈥�

The article, 鈥�,鈥� continues the Rivera-Serrano Lab鈥檚 work exploring the potential of reoviruses as cancer-targeting agents. The study examined a panel of genetically distinct reoviruses across three epithelial cancer cell models. The work found that different reovirus strains showed cell line-dependent patterns of infectivity and cancer cell killing, with some reassortant viruses showing enhanced activity compared with parental strains. The findings suggest that the effectiveness of reovirus-based cancer-targeting approaches may depend not only on viral genetics, but also on the specific cancer cell context.

Reoviruses are being studied as potential oncolytic agents, or viruses that preferentially infect and kill cancer cells. While much of the field has focused on one prototype strain, the Elon study highlights the importance of exploring broader reovirus genetic diversity. Because reoviruses contain segmented genomes, different strains can exchange genome segments through a process known as reassortment, generating viruses with new combinations of traits that may influence infection, replication and cytotoxicity.

The article reinforces the value of comparative screens in cancer virotherapy research. The study found that viral infectivity and cancer cell killing did not always fully overlap, suggesting that efficient infection alone does not necessarily predict how strongly a virus will reduce cancer cell viability. Instead, the findings point to a more complex relationship among viral entry, replication, antiviral responses and cell death pathways.

The project builds on ongoing research in Rivera-Serrano鈥檚 laboratory, where undergraduate students use cell biology, virology and immunology approaches to understand how viral genetics influence cancer cell susceptibility. Hutchinson, the article鈥檚 first author and Nursing major, contributed to experimental work and data analysis as part of his mentored research experience in the lab for three semesters and participation in Elon鈥檚 2025 Summer Undergraduate Research Experience.

Carter, who performed research as a visiting high school student in the summer of 2025, contributed to data analysis, highlighting the lab鈥檚 broader commitment to expanding access to biomedical research experiences beyond the undergraduate level. Dagli, who recently co-authored a related study in Virus Genes on reovirus reassortants with enhanced activity against fibrosarcoma cells, also contributed to the current work as part of the lab鈥檚 continuing effort to evaluate how viral genetic diversity shapes oncolytic potential.

Students across two courses (ENS 1100: Humans and Nature (Spring 2025)聽and WHE 2850: Perspectives in Personal and Global Health聽(Spring 2025)) completed eight outdoor sit spots over the course of a month as part of a course assignment. Students were asked to spend time in an outdoor space on campus, and quietly observe their surroundings, noting a range of sensory experiences, and reflect on the changes in that space over time. Using a pre- and post-test model, they found statistically significant improvements in mindfulness, positive affect, and nature connectedness in students across the two courses.

The newly published article, “,” is authored by Elon faculty, Kelsey Bitting and Jill McSweeney, Elon alum Elyssa Kaufman 鈥�25 (Environmental Sciences), and graduating senior, Kira Campagna 鈥�26, an elementary education major, with a minor in environmental education). The work builds on growing research connecting nature exposure and contemplative practices with improved student wellness and academic outcomes.

Student researchers, Kaufman and Campagna, played a central role throughout the project and have at several undergraduate research and pedagogical conferences. Their project work specifically examined how outdoor mindfulness practices influenced mood, mindful awareness, and students鈥� relationship with nature. Their presentations highlighted significant increases in positive affect, nature connectedness and mindfulness among students who completed the sit spot assignment.

In collaboration with Evan Small, additional research this past academic year recruited over 80 students across four courses (i.e., ENS 1100: Humans and Nature (Fall 2025), WHE 1150: Stress and Wellness (Fall 2025), HEU 1719: Foraging and Wild Foods (Fall 2025), and COR 3555: Foraging Wild Food and Medicine (Spring 鈥�26)). Using data from these four courses, graduating senior, Abigail Manning (Environmental Sciences) recently explored how sit spots affect students鈥� mindfulness and nature connectivity across different majors and disciplines. Her research found that students in nature-focused majors often experienced even stronger gains in mindfulness and nature connectedness through the sit spot practice.

The research team plans to continue building on these findings over the summer. Kiley Sherlock 鈥�27, an environmental sciences major, will conduct qualitative analysis on student reflections for her Summer Undergraduate Research Experience, exploring how students define nature and further exploring how the sit spot practice impacts student stress across the semester. The team also plans on additional publications exploring the impact of student demographics, and focus on a practice-oriented piece on how to support colleagues to bring contemplative pedagogies which incorporate nature into their classrooms to support the wellbeing of students and themselves.

Together, the project reflects Elon鈥檚 commitment to engaged learning and undergraduate research, while also contributing meaningful scholarship to conversations around student wellness, mindfulness, and environmental connection.

The 29 students were divided into teams and paired with faculty advisors who guided them throughout the yearlong process.

鈥淭hese students got this project in August in the form of a two- or three-page document and an email address to contact, and they took it from there,鈥� said Will Pluer, assistant professor of engineering. 鈥淭hey broke down their projects into subsystems and tasks, we had weekly scrum meetings where it felt like only little things were being achieved and eventually those little things turned into mockups in the fall and full prototypes this spring.鈥�

One team partnered with Gilbarco Veeder-Root to improve security measures for gas station pumps that had experienced break-ins. The group added a sensor to the bottom of the machine to alert owners to unauthorized access, reinforced the bottom latch and installed an electrical component designed to preserve data during power outages.

Rahv Tupac-Yupanqui 鈥�26, a mechanical engineering major from Virginia Beach, Virginia, said the project was a thorough culmination of years of coursework.

鈥淲e take classes where you do specific projects here and there, and eventually, down the line, it turns out that a skill, or many skills, that you learned on a specific project will help you do larger projects,鈥� Tupac-Yupanqui said.

While students had worked with clients in previous engineering courses, Tupac-Yupanqui said the scale of the project and the level of communication with the company made this experience different.

鈥淚t feels like a huge privilege to be able to communicate with a company at such an intensive rate,鈥� Tupac-Yupanqui said. 鈥淚鈥檓 really glad I got to do it because it gives me a really good perspective on what an engineering company does. Even though no engineering company works the same way, there is always a level of understanding that happens between engineers.鈥�

Another team partnered with Driver Rehabilitation Services to redesign a Sure Grip vehicle driving system for people with physical impairments.

The original system had a “jerking” and rotational movement when pulled to accelerate the vehicle. Students redesigned the mechanism, so it moved back and forth along a single plane.

鈥淲henever you pulled it back for acceleration, instead of moving in a straight line forward and back, it would rotate a little bit toward the center of your chest,鈥� said Wiley Falter 鈥�26, a mechanical engineering major from Fayetteville, North Carolina. 鈥淚t鈥檚 fine for a driver that has full arm strength, but quadriplegic drivers only have strength coming from their shoulder, and so everyone would push in. It made it really awkward to push it back out, get it back into idle and brake.鈥�

Like Tupac-Yupanqui, Falter said working with a real client was one of the most valuable parts of the experience.

鈥淚t was cool to communicate with the engineers who work there,鈥� Falter said. 鈥淲e all really enjoyed that part the most because it gave you a view into the real world of engineering and not just the bubble of being in college. It was super fun to get really constructive criticism on everything that we did.鈥�

Pluer said the hands-on, client-based experience is what makes the course unique.

鈥淚t鈥檚 really important for us to give our students real problems to tackle,鈥� Pluer said. 鈥淲e鈥檙e moving out of the classroom into careers, so we give them projects from clients that push them and make them realize that engineering is truly a service industry, serving others through design.鈥�