The University of Montana Conference on Undergraduate Research (UMCUR) is a premier showcase of the many opportunities undergraduate students are afforded thanks to UM's coveted R1 Research status. From impacts on alpine flora to bringing physical therapy to telehealth, undergraduates take the helm of research on campus, showcasing their creativity, innovation and curiosity.
Scroll below to get a taste of the research presented at UMCUR 2025, including five participants who are going places with their grit, determination and hard work (AKA The Montana Way):
Read More: We Are R1 - UM Celebrates Top Research Status
David Payseno, Junior in the Social Work Program
David Payseno from Arizona began his journey in higher education after serving in the Army as a paratrooper and combat engineer in Iraq and decided he wanted to become a counselor to work with other veterans.
While taking courses in the social work program, Payseno noticed that there was not much instruction related to the effects of war on society. As he looked into it, he noticed that the Council on Social Work Education’s accreditation standards does not mention war, combat veterans or armed conflict in its nine core competencies.
“This actually strikes me as pretty odd because the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs is actually the largest employer of social workers in the country,” Payseno said. “It’s pretty likely that somebody coming out of a social work program might have to work with this population at some point in their career.”
To further his study, Payseno wants to explore the curriculum for the Masters of Social Work program at UM as well as other universities.
“I’d like to sit with currently working social workers who serve veteran populations to discern absences in skills or knowledge of new practitioners coming into the field,” he said. “I would also like to collaborate with educators to develop and implement anti-war education for social work.”
Ashlynn Everett, Communicative Sciences and Disorders Major with Minors in Neuroscience and Violin Performance
Undergraduate researchers at UM, like Ashlynn Everett of Missoula, work to better understand why bilingual people who experience aphasia can find improvements in one language while being treated by a specialist speaking a different one.
Aphasia is a language disorder where one loses the ability to understand or express speech after a traumatic brain injury or stroke. And aphasia’s effects on bilingual people and how to treat it is not widely understood and could be dependent on factors such as which languages a person speaks, how proficient they are in those languages or what area of the brain was impacted by the injury.
“There’s been so little data collected on that effect,” Everett said. “We really don’t know what exact variables are causing it, and we need to prioritize larger sample sizes in bilingual aphasia research.”
Everett said the opportunity to work in the grammar, aphasia and bilingualism lab as an undergraduate at UM has been instrumental to her higher education journey.
“Getting into a lab was so much easier than it would be at other schools,” she said. “It’s opened up so many doors. I’ve traveled to Hawaii and Japan to present at conferences and met people at universities I may pursue grad school at.”
Samantha Yeats, Senior in the School of Integrative Physiology and Athletic Training
Finding a physical therapist to help overcome an injury can be challenging, especially for people in rural areas. But what if you could attend your appointments from the comfort of your own home?
Samantha Yeats and her classmates researched the use of different motion capture systems, such as body sensors and cameras, to grow physical therapy opportunities through telehealth treatment.
“Our project tried to see if motion capture technology could be a good, cheap alternative method that we could send to patients in remote locations, or people who don’t have access to physical therapy clinics,” Yeats said. “We can send them these headsets or these cameras, and they can perform PT on their own.”
Yeats first got involved in undergraduate research at UM as a subject in other studies on campus, which eventually opened the door to work on projects she was interested in.
“This experience has been very validating, and it’s awesome to be able to know you’re putting your work into something that can change people’s lives, and we definitely found some good information to suggest that this is the future of telehealth,” Yeats said.
Christopher Cardella, Junior Environmental Science Major
After two years studying how warming temperatures impact alpine flora, UM environmental science junior Christopher Cardella of Boise, Idaho was excited to exhibit preliminary results at UMCUR.
He examined how three species of flowering alpine plants responded to increasing temperatures, examining germination, growth and survival. These plants grow in the tundra – one of Earth’s most extreme environments and a region experiencing disproportionate warming. While the tundra hosts a short growing season, these plants open up ecological niches, keep soil moist and add nutrients to the ground.
“If these plants are present, it opens the door for a ton of biological diversity,” Cardella said.
His findings indicated that as temperatures warm, more plants will germinate but fewer will ultimately survive.
“There's a mismatch between what warming triggers and what a plant can actually handle,” Cardella said.
UMCUR was perfect practice for presenting his completed project to the Ecological Society of America in August. Cardella also is working to get his research published and has another project already in the pipeline.
“I’m hoping to have two publications by the end of my senior year,” Cardella said, underscoring the value of undergraduate research in distinguishing a resume when applying to graduate school.
Adria Capozzoli, Senior Anthropology Major with a Geography Minor
Adria Capozzoli, a senior anthropology major from Great Falls, leveraged UM itself as the subject of her research, “Bronze and Bulletin Boards: Indigenous Language in Formal and Informal Campus Space.”
Capozzoli surveyed the presence of Indigenous language on campus space, examined Indigenous language visibility and contemplated the nature of lived-in spaces at UM. She inspected areas such as student and staff lounges, green spaces, plaques and memorials, and others.
“Visual ethnography is like an exploration,” Capozzoli said. “There is a world of difference and a lot to think about when considering officially sanctioned memorials, like heritage management, versus informal uses of space.”
This was Capozzoli's second year participating in UMCUR. She said the conference facilitates a supportive, approachable avenue for students to discuss their work and passion.
“I care very deeply for the ability of students to access this kind of environment,” Capozzoli said of UMCUR, noting that some undergraduates might feel overwhelmed about the research process.
“I was thrilled and relieved to learn that it was warm and inviting,” she said. “You're here with a lot of other people who genuinely care about each other’s passions.”
