Overview
Undergraduate University Scholars receive a University Scholarship providing full-tuition plus a stipend towards room, board and mandatory fees for eight semesters. Summer sessions at Duke are not covered by the scholarship, but eligible students may apply for additional support through the Office of Financial Aid. Additionally, Duke University will meet 100% of the demonstrated need of all admitted University Scholars.
University Scholars can expect that any additional demonstrated financial need beyond the costs covered by the scholarship will be covered by grants, not loans. For example, Financial Aid will also provide grants to cover the cost of health insurance for those students who cannot afford it on their own or round-trip travel to and from Duke and home.
For more details on financial support for undergraduate University Scholars, please visit the Merit Scholarship Recipients page on the Duke Financial Aid website.
University Scholars Seminars
These informal seminars, held every two weeks, bring together graduate and professional school University Scholars, undergraduate scholars, and interested faculty, as well as distinguished visiting scholars, scientists and artists.
There are typically six seminars per semester, and topics depend on the guest speakers’ areas of expertise. Students of all levels are encouraged to lead a seminar on their own work-in-progress or on a topic of particular interest to them. Faculty and student seminar hosts share their ideas with a lay but intellectually engaged audience from a variety of disciplinary backgrounds and discuss how interdisciplinary perspectives can impact the issues presented.
Undergraduate University Scholars Summer Enrichment Program
Undergraduate University Scholars in good standing may receive support up to $7000 for an intensive internship, research experience, or summer abroad.
Typically, students receive such funding for the summer following their third year, although in some cases, students have received permission to use funding sooner. Students eligible for summer enrichment funding must demonstrate active participation in USP seminars and events, in addition to being in good academic standing. Students must submit a proposal, a letter of support from a faculty advisor, and a detailed budget (guidelines are available online on the USP Sakai site). Upon their return, students must submit a brief report summarizing the experience and lead a USP seminar to discuss their projects with other University Scholars.
Annual University Scholars Symposium
Each year, University Scholars will showcase their research and scholarship in a symposium to which the entire university community is invited. Symposia feature a keynote speaker invited by the University Scholars and group presentations featuring undergraduate, graduate and professional school scholars working together to present their ideas. Previous symposia include:
- Reflections (2020)
- “(In)dependence” (2019)
- “Masquerade” (2018)
- “Progress” (2017)
- “Relativity” (2016)
- “Fundamentals” (2015)
- “Reason(s)” (2014)
- “Futures: See What Lies Ahead” (2013)
- “Puzzles” (2012)
- “Taste: Determining, Modifying, Consequences” (2011)
- “Legacies: Commemorating 10 Years of the USP” (2010)
- “Two Cultures: 50 Years Later” (2009)
- “Recycling: Ideas, Materials, & Experiences” (2008)
- “Interdisciplinarity in Practice” (2007)
- “Cities in Evolution: Imagination and Reinvention” (2006)
- “The End of the World (As We Know It)” (2005)
- “Truth Lies Within <-> Within Lies Truth” (2004)
- “We Will Remember It For You” (2003)
- “Exposing Privacy” (2002)
- “Perspectives on Political Change: South Africa and USA” (2001)
- “From Faust to the Future: The Costs & Rewards of [too much?] Knowledge” (2000)
The University Scholars Program has begun an outreach initiative called Bull City Scholars. Undergraduate University Scholars take a house course in the spring of their first year. After completing the course, students then commit to participating for one year or more in Bull City Scholars, a club within the University Scholars Program, pending formal recognition by SOFC, Duke’s Student Organization Finance Committee, elected by the Duke Student Government Senate.
Students involved in Bull City Scholars work in partnership with Neal Middle School, part of the Durham Public School system. Students can gain or hone leadership skills through officer positions in the club. Outreach opportunities at Neal include tutoring, leading after-school clubs, mentoring, and college access workshops.
University Scholars Breakfasts
USP Breakfasts bring University Scholars together once a month in the casual setting of campus cafés to talk about matters ranging from the practical to the esoteric.
University Scholars Mentoring
An informal, intellectual mentoring program offers interdisciplinary research possibilities, helps to shape multidisciplinary interests into an interdisciplinary program, and encourages collaborative thinking and intellectual risk-taking. Mentoring also allows for more informal advising and conversations about life experience and development. Mentoring in the USP is a student-driven endeavor. Relationships are established between pairs of graduate or professional school students and undergraduates.
Each undergraduate University scholar has two mentors who are students at Duke’s graduate or professional schools. All mentors/mentee pairs meet at least twice per semester, if not more frequently.
