First ‘SuperUROPs’ cap off inaugural year
How can crowdsourcing help plan your next vacation? How good are government officials at living up to their promises? And who among the millions of students taking online courses are likeliest to drop out? These are all questions researchers are tackling in MIT’s Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS). But the researchers heading up these projects aren’t faculty members or graduate students — they’re undergraduates who are making discoveries in fields like web security, bioinformatics and motion planning while balancing problem sets, campus activities and, for many seniors, job interviews. Seventy-seven SuperUROP students were given certificates as class members, administrative and teaching staff gathered on May 9 to celebrate the program's inaugural year.Photo: Bethany Versoy These undergraduates — 77 juniors and seniors majoring in EECS — are the first to complete a program known colloquially as “SuperUROP,” a play on MIT’s longstanding Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP). The program,...