Undergraduate Internship Program

CESTA's summer undergraduate program provides an immersive, ten-week research experience in which undergraduates work closely with faculty and graduate mentors on projects that integrate data science and humanistic inquiry. Students contribute to activities such as data collection, analysis, and visualization while developing a deeper understanding of how digital tools can illuminate cultural, historical, and social questions.

The program emphasizes both skill development and intellectual growth. Students apply new methods to active research projects, work across disciplinary boundaries, and reflect on how their contributions shape broader conversations in the humanities. Shared programming, including skills workshops, community activities, and public research showcases, creates opportunities for students to learn from one another and articulate how their research experience connects to their academic and professional goals.

In Summer 2025, twenty-two students participated in the program, with nineteen positions funded by VPUE and additional students supported by CESTA and individual faculty research funds.

Internship Mentoring

Each CESTA summer project is led by a faculty principal investigator who provides intellectual direction and a graduate mentor who offers day-to-day guidance. This layered mentoring structure ensures consistent feedback, individualized support, and opportunities for students to learn from mentors at different stages of their academic careers.

CESTA’s centralized program structure supports this mentoring model by providing shared onboarding, coordination, and community programming. This infrastructure allows faculty and graduate mentors to focus on research and mentorship while giving students a cohesive, well-supported research experience that would be difficult for individual projects to sustain on their own.