Meet the URCT
“The Experiential World of D’Arcy McNickle” website, ClioVis timeline, Google Earth story map, and temporary exhibit at the Carolina Community Garden began as a project supported by the Office of Undergraduate Research’s (OUR) Undergraduate Research Consultant Team (URCT) program. Here are brief biographies of the original team members who served from January 2020 to May 2021. The team would also like to acknowledge the invaluable assistance received from Dr. Gabriel Moss of the UNC Department of History’s Digital History Lab and Claire Lorch at the Carolina Community Garden.
Dr. Dan Cobb is a Professor of American Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. An award-winning teacher and writer, he is the author or editor of several books and articles, including Native Activism in Cold War America, Beyond Red Power, Say We Are Nations, and the Native Peoples of North America Great Courses, which was created in partnership with The Teaching Company and the National Museum of the American Indian.
Mackenzie Collura-Repp is an Honors student double majoring in Sociology and Political Science and minoring in Russian at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. After undergrad she plans to attend law school and hopes to become a Civil Rights attorney. She aspires to work directly with communities to fight for policy and social change. You can find her LinkedIn here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mackenzie-collura-repp-727a93199.
Samara A. Perez Labra is a rising undergraduate senior double majoring in Sociology and Public Policy with a minor in Spanish. She is an aspiring social scientist who is interested in Latin American Indigenous communities’ cultures and languages. She hopes to be part of research projects to help inform an effective and just policy-making process. You can find her LinkedIn here: http://linkedin.com/in/samaraairy.
Gabrielle Walton is an undergraduate student pursuing degrees in Psychology and French and Francophone studies. Her interests in history and psychology are reflected in her participation in research not only with Professor Cobb, but also as a research assistant in the Developmental Neuroscience Lab at UNC. After a semester living abroad during Spring 2022, she is hopeful to increase her linguistic ability in French and her understanding of French culture.
Grace Yannotta is a rising senior, studying English with a minor in History. Her play, “Smirit Se,” was workshopped with the Process Series in February 2022, and she is a member of the 2023 Writing for the Screen and Stage cohort. She is co-Editor-in-Chief of Limeaid, an unconventional publication for non-conforming voices, and is a freelance writer and poet, with over fifty publications in the last three years. She won the inaugural Zachary Doss Friends in Letters Memorial Fellowship for her poetry and was nominated for the Best of the Net awards in 2019 for her prose.