Mentoring Undergraduates to Engage with the "So What?" of Scholarly Inquiry

Abstract

This commentary encourages mentors to incorporate two key practices into undergraduate research and creative inquiry: open science and public-facing scholarship. Open science promotes transparency and accessibility in research, and public scholarship focuses on sharing academic work beyond traditional academic audiences. To support faculty as they guide students through these practices, we introduce the design, analysis, perform, action (DAPA) framework, a simple decision-making tool. This approach helps students take an active role in their research experiences. We provide two examples from liberal arts undergraduate institutions to illustrate how faculty have used the model in practice. The commentary ends with four practical lessons for mentors, highlighting the importance of intentionality and collaboration with students.