The Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP) in the Division of Undergraduate Education encourages and facilitates research and creative activities by undergraduates from all schools and academic disciplines at UCI. Research opportunities are available not only from every discipline, interdisciplinary program, and school, but also from many outside agencies, including national laboratories, industrial partners, and other universities. UROP offers assistance to students and faculty through all phases of the research process, whether it is with proposal writing, developing research plans through project management skills, awarding grants to fund research projects, scholarly journal writing through The UCI Undergraduate Research Journal, or presenting results of the research or creative project through the UCI Undergraduate Research Symposium. This experience provides students with the necessary skills to succeed in their future careers. Conducting research and creative activities should be an integral component of the education undergraduates receive at UCI, regardless of their career choice.

The mission of UROP is to integrate undergraduate students into the research culture of the University by providing opportunities for faculty and students to work together on research and creative projects. UROP helps support both the research mission of the University and its educational programs while promoting an undergraduate research culture at UCI. We foster collaborations between students, faculty, corporate entities and government agencies to prepare the undergraduate researcher for the challenges of tomorrow. By providing professional environments conducive to research advancement and career skills development, UROP provides students with unique opportunities to develop a wide variety of skills that will be useful in any future career or educational plans. By engaging students in research and creative opportunities, we hope to inspire in them a life-long passion for discovery and inquiry-based learning.

Launched in 1995, UROP has grown sharply in recent years and has received wide support from the faculty, including the active involvement of the UROP Faculty Advisory Board. UROP announced its first Call for Proposals in the Spring of 1996, has managed the UCI Undergraduate Research Symposium since 1997, started publishing The UCI Undergraduate Research Journal in 1998, and began the Summer Undergraduate Research Program (SURP) in 2001. In 2005, UROP expanded its summer offerings, sponsoring the Inter-Disciplinary Summer Undergraduate Research Experience (ID-SURE) and Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship in Information Technology (SURF-IT). In addition to these programs for UCI students only, the Integrated Micro/Nano Summer Undergraduate Research Experience (IM-SURE), first offered in 2005, and the Chemistry Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (Chem-SURF), launched in 2008, offer students from around the country the opportunity to experience UCI's world-class research environment.

The number of student projects funded by UROP has increased to more than 400 per year, involving more than 650 students; nearly 150 students have participated in SURP annually. Additionally, The UCI Undergraduate Research Journal now receives more than 70 submissions each year, and the UCI Undergraduate Research Symposium includes approximately 500 presentations of undergraduate work and involves more than 600 students.

Our development reflects the contributions of our participants and strategic partners. Undergraduate researchers, faculty mentors, leaders in government, industry and the community look to UROP to establish a network of cooperation that extends beyond the realm of academia. UROP provides an opportunity for all our participants to interact in this network to further individual goals and the development of the entire cooperative. UROP protects the integrity of this network by adhering to principles of trust, communication, cooperation, and high morals and ethics.