UROP Students Showcase ICPSR Data Preservation Work at the Michigan League

ANN ARBOR—This year, ICPSR’s Isabella Kan, project assistant for the Resource Center for Minority Data (RCMD), mentored two Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program (UROP) students on an ICPSR data preservation initiative—supporting behind-the-scenes work that helps research data remain usable, understandable, and discoverable over time.

Together, the team contributed to ICPSR’s preservation workflows by identifying and uploading documentation to existing DataLumos projects and updating project metadata. These improvements may sound technical, but they have an immediate impact: clearer documentation and stronger metadata make datasets easier to find, interpret, and reuse—helping researchers spend less time deciphering files and more time doing analysis.

In addition to the shared preservation work, each student pursued an independent project that combined new workshop skills with what they learned through hands-on preservation tasks. Both students presented their work on April 22, 2026, at the UROP Spring 2026 Research Symposium held at the Michigan League in Ann Arbor. They joined peers from across campus in a public celebration of undergraduate research.

Photos from the event capture Alice Harman’s poster and presentation from earlier that morning, along with the poster session environment at the League. Joey Milnamow also presented his poster at the Michigan League, highlighting the breadth of student contributions supported through this mentorship and preservation experience.