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An increased focus on high-impact pedagogical practices at a small, residential, higher education institution led to a grant-funded project to gather and analyze multidimensional data on 10,155 residential foreclosures in central Illinois from 2006 to 2013. Student researchers applied skills gained through academic coursework to investigate a real-world issue in the local community and communicated their findings to a variety of stakeholders, including local governments, nonprofit organizations, banks, and social agencies. The direct assessment of 85 capstone-level research projects reveals that those with a community service focus displayed a stronger mastery by students of particular expected proficiencies relative to research projects with a traditional scholarly focus.

Interest in supporting undergraduate research programs continues to grow within academic librarianship. This article presents how undergraduate research program coordinators perceive and value library support of their programs. Undergraduate research coordinators from a variety of institutions were surveyed on which elements of libraries and library services they valued, and where libraries could improve and develop services for undergraduate researchers and their faculty mentors. This article seeks to present a critical perspective on library support for undergraduate research programs from an important external constituent group of faculty and administrators. The data and recommendations can further conversations and aid collaboration between librarians and their campus colleagues.

Undergraduate research is defined by the Council on Undergraduate Research (CUR) as "an inquiry or investigation conducted by an undergraduate student that makes an original intellectual or creative contribution to the discipline." This study serves as a snapshot of current library practices in relation to formal undergraduate research programs and identifies common elements of library support among different types of institutions. The results of this research fill a gap in both the library and education literature, provide critical background data for libraries wishing to build support for undergraduate research programs, and suggest a foundation for further research into an underexplored area.

Although there are currently only a few undergraduate journals in economics, we expect their numbers to increase substantially in the future because of several developments: (1) research and writing activity is increasing in economics programs, (2) online publication is now more feasible and cost efficient than ever, and (3) students are increasingly aware of their on-line identity and desire to project a positive and professional image. Since increasing use of undergraduate journals might benefit a number of students, including potential article authors, article reviewers, and editors, there is a need to begin to assess the educational benefits of participation in journals.This paper reports results from a survey of reviewers who had reviewed articles for two undergraduate journals, "The Park Place Economist" and The "Undergraduate Economic Review." The reviewers generally agreed that they received a range of benefits from the review process and nearly all agreed that reviewing had been a valuable use of their time. Several of the suggested benefits were positively correlated with measures of participation intensity. Nearly half the respondents thought the benefits would have been greater with more, not fewer, articles to review. (Contains 3 tables.)