Undergraduate Sustainability Research Award

The Undergraduate Sustainability Research Award promotes in-depth understanding of sustainability topics,
research strategies, and the use of library resources, providing participating students with vital skills they will carry into future academic and vocational endeavors.  It is funded by the award-winning UMass Amherst Libraries’ Sustainability Fund. 
 

Multiple scholarships between $1,000-$2,500 will be awarded. 

We are again accepting two types of submissions this year: 

Option 1: A project based on previous academic work related to sustainability completed during Spring 2025, Summer 2025, Fall 2025, or Spring 2026 semesters and while an undergraduate student at UMass Amherst. This academic work can be in any format (paper, poster, presentation, art, video, etc.) and needs to be supported by facts (which are cited).

Before submitting, confirm that your previous academic work meets all eligibility requirements and revise the work as needed.

Academic works co-created or co-authored with graduate students, faculty, staff members, or anyone who is not a UMass Amherst undergraduate student are not eligible for this award.

Option 2: An original research project completed during Spring 2025, Summer 2025, Fall 2025, or Spring 2026 semesters and while an undergraduate student at UMass Amherst. This project needs to be supported by facts (which are cited), but does not need to be tied to a class. It can be in any format (paper, poster, presentation, art, video, etc.).

Projects co-created or co-authored with graduate students, faculty, staff members, or anyone who is not a UMass Amherst undergraduate student are not eligible for this award.

For both options, the submission form will ask you to include:

• A context statement telling why you chose the topic or focus area of your submission and describing specifically how it relates to sustainability. Art submissions can include your artists' statement as long as it explicitly states how it relates to sustainability. (maximum 300 words)
• How you used library resources.
• Statement of support from a UMass Amherst faculty member who knows your work (does not have to be the instructor of the course for previous work). Upload a document from the faculty member, which could be either an email (with headers showing it came from the faculty member) or a signed letter. This letter or memo should endorse your application. A faculty member simply agreeing to write you a statement of support is not sufficient. The letter or memo should include comments from the faculty member on the strength of your work or your abilities as a student, in the context of this award. 

Additional Information

• If submitting previous work, you will be prompted for the class it was for and the assignment.
• If submitting a video or audio file, include a transcript.

Group Submissions: 

• Only one member of the group should submit an entry.
• ALL group members need to be current UMass undergraduate students (no graduate students, faculty, staff members, or anyone who is not a UMass Amherst undergraduate student can be part of the group).
• The submission form will have space to list other group members, along with their SPIRE id.
• If selected as one of the winning entries, group members will split the scholarship. 

To learn more about sustainability efforts at UMass check out these links:

January 29, 2026 - Open for submissions (Beginning of Spring Semester)

March 13, 2026 - Application materials due by 5:00 p.m. (Late submissions will not be accepted. Incomplete submissions will not be eligible for award consideration.)

April 2, 2026 - Notification of awards emailed out

April 10, 2026 - RSVPs for reception due

April TBD, 2026 - Reception at the Science & Engineering Library to recognize and celebrate award winners

Eligibility Requirements:

• Must be a full- or part-time UMass Amherst undergraduate enrolled in any discipline and at any level.
  • If you are in a 4+1 program, you are only eligible while you are in the first 4 years. 
• Diversity of age, ability, race, religion, gender, social class, educational background is welcome.
• Submissions must be completely the work of UMass Amherst undergraduate students - no faculty, staff, graduate student, or non-UMass Amherst undergraduate student co-authors or collaborators.
• If awarded, you agree to have your submission added to ScholarWorks, the UMass Amherst digital showcase (with a Creative Commons license of your choosing)

• If awarded, you will make every effort to attend library reception at the Science & Engineering Library on April TBD (time TBD). If you absolutely cannot attend in-person, you will be asked to submit a 5-minute video presentation about your project. 

The submission form will accept applications from January 29, 2026 until 5:00 p.m. March 13, 2026. 

Link to submission form.

All parts of your submission packet, including the faculty letter, must be submitted prior to the deadline. Late submissions will not be accepted. Incomplete submissions will not be eligible for award consideration.

The submission form requires:

• Name, UMass email, and SPIRE id for the submitter and if a group entry, for each member of the group. 
• A context statement telling why you chose the topic or focus area of your submission and describing specifically how it relates to sustainability. Art submissions can include your artists' statement as long as it explicitly states how it relates to sustainability. (maximum 300 words)
• How you used library resources.
• Indication of the Citation Style used for references.
• Statement of support from a UMass Amherst faculty member who knows your work (does not have to be the instructor of the course for previous work). Upload a document from the faculty member, which could be either an email (with headers showing it came from the faculty member) or a signed letter. This letter or memo should endorse your application. A faculty member simply agreeing to write you a statement of support is not sufficient. The letter or memo should include comments from the faculty member on the strength of your work or your abilities as a student, in the context of this award.
• For previous academic work, the class name, course number, and assignment.
• A file upload of your previous academic work or original research project.
  • You will only be allowed to upload 1 file. We acknowledge that many courses have multiple assignments that build upon each other, but please choose only one of those assignments to submit.
• Declaration that the work was done by UMass Amherst undergraduate students and does not include contributions from graduate students, faculty, staff members, or anyone who is not a UMass Amherst undergraduate student.

Submissions will be reviewed by a panel of librarians and staff from the Science & Engineering Library.

Evaluation criteria includes:

• Substantive Topic
  • Potential for sustainability change or broader sustainability awareness/appreciation (environmental, social, and/or economic).
  • Broad scope (geographic or in aspect of sustainability work) or in-depth analysis score highest.
• Research Strategy
  • Research methodology
    • UMass Libraries/other resources searched
    • keywords used or other search strategies
    • use of sources to find other sources
  • Depth and breadth of sources
    • All academic? All from single journal/NGO?
    • Direct quotes only? Or supporting ideas behind other arguments, too?
  • Refer to information provided on submission form
• Attribution of Sources
  • Consistent formatting throughout with in-text notation (superscript, author-date, etc.) and complete reference list or footnotes/endnotes.
  • Quotes, paraphrasing, and credit for others' original ideas all clearly attributed.
  • Sources include all information needed for reviewers to track down full text.
  • Applicants should declare the citation style they are using.
    • We suggest you choose APA, MLA, AMA, Chicago/Turabian or another popular citation style. 
    • No points lost for minutia of punctuation/capitalization, as long as overall style is consistent.
• Effectiveness of Communication 
  • Compelling narrative or imagery, writing is coherent/imagery conveys the meaning intended (compare to context statement from submission form), facts are conveyed to support the argument/emotions evoked as intended.
  • Disregard minor grammatical mistakes.
• Overall Impression

Check out these FAQs for answers to questions you might have:

• Who can be a creator on a submission to be considered for an award?
  • Only UMass Amherst undergraduate students can be creators or co-creators on submissions in order for a project to be considered eligible. If there are graduate students, staff, or faculty authors on the project (UMass Amherst-affiliated or not), the submission will not be considered eligible.
  • We do understand that undergraduates may work under the guidance of faculty or graduate students. Provided their submission (a paper, presentation, etc) is authored without any graduate student, staff, or faculty co-authors, then it is eligible, even if the project was done in collaboration with/under the guidance of a larger group.
• I completed a project last semester that I think would be a good fit for this award. Can I submit it?
  • A submission is eligible if the project was created in Spring 2025, Summer 2025, Fall 2025, and Spring 2026 while the creator is an undergraduate student at UMass Amherst.
• Are video submissions allowed?
  • Yes! Please note that we will only accept one file per submission, although any video or audio recordings that do not have captions are required to upload a transcript file as well.
• How are faculty statements of support evaluated? 

  • You should consider the faculty statement of support a letter (or memo) endorsing your application. There is no explicit length requirement, but we expect some comment from the faculty member on the strength of your work, or your abilities as a student, in the context of this award. A single sentence of endorsement would not be sufficient. 

• Can I submit multiple proposals?

  • Yes! You can submit multiple proposals that meet the eligibility criteria.