Dear MRC Community,

In an effort to be more interdisciplinary and accessible, the MRC's name is changing to MRADS (= Michigan Research and Discovery Scholars).  The name change will be gradual, but we are already starting to use it for recruiting next year's scholars. After much discussion, it was decided that adding the 'discovery scholars' phrase to our name may make it less intimidating and ​more welcoming to students who don't yet know much about research. Also, researchers in the humanities and social sciences suggested that the term would be more inclusive of their fields of research.

There are thousands of people who make up the broader research community at UM. Many people (outside of the MRC) think that the "Michigan Research Community" refers to everyone at UM who does research - even though we know it really means a wonderful group of ​students who all live in MoJo and do research as freshmen (at least).​ Thus, it seems that not only is MRADS a cool, new acronym for us, but it may be more attractive to a wider range of people (including high school students who are intimidated by 'research', but intrigued by the opportunity to become a 'discovery scholar'). It may be a better, more accurate description of who we are. Give it a chance.

Don't worry. The MRC isn't going away. It is evolving from MRC to MRC/MRADS to MRADS (formerly MRC), and eventually to MRADS. We'll still be the same cohesive community, only with a new, more inclusive and accessible name, that reflects our inclusive and fabulous community of scholars. 

Onward,

Laura