Your first week as an Illinois student
To those first-year students, welcome to campus! And for those returning, welcome back!
Voices of ACES Blog
Everything I wish I knew about applying to college
As the fall semester approaches and I prepare to begin my fourth and final year at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, I’ve found myself reflecting on the very beginning of my college journey. It was the summer in between junior and senior years of high school, and I was the first of my siblings to go to college, so this whole process was very foreign to me and my family.
ACES student takes home ASPB hackaton award
Jack Mason, an undergraduate student in the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences, won a hackathon competition at Plant Biology 2024, a yearly conference held by the American Society of Plant Biologists.
ACES Family Academies alum finds family, home at ACES
Every summer, alumni of the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences (ACES) at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign are invited back to campus with their kids or grandkids for ACES Family Academies. The two-day event introduces kids ages 8–13 to ACES majors, programs, and research through fun interactive classes and gives them a taste of campus life with meals in dining halls and a night in the dorms.
Illinois studies explore converting wastewater to fertilizer with fungal treatment
Creating fertilizers from organic waste can help reduce the consumption of fossil fuels and promote sustainable production. One way of doing this is through hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL), which converts biomass into biocrude oil through a high-temperature, high-pressure process. Two studies from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign explore the use of a fungal treatment to convert the leftover wastewater into fertilizer for agricultural crops.
Voices of ACES Blog
Oh the places you'll go with ACES
The world is your classroom at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, College of Agricultural Consumer and Environmental Sciences. While our campus buzzes with diverse connections and innovative ideas, our education abroad programs take learning across oceans and to new heights, from mountain tops to jungles.
Wastewater is a viable medium for growing lettuce in hydroponic systems, study shows
Urban agriculture has the potential to improve food security through local, efficient, and sustainable food production. Examples of urban food systems include hydroponics, where plants grow in a nutrient solution without soil, and aquaponics, which combines hydroponics with raising fish in tanks.
University of Illinois takes first in team judging at national soil judging competition
This April, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign students were among 25 teams participating in the National Collegiate Soil Judging Contest hosted by Iowa State University near Ames, Iowa. The Illinois team earned first place in the team-judging category and 13th in the competition overall. The team was led by Liz Miernicki and assistant coach Scott Wiesbrook, both soil scientists at the Illinois Natural History Survey, part of the Prairie Research Institute.
ACES senior on improving veterinary mental health, compassion for animals
Students in the Department of Animal Sciences at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign are often drawn to careers enhancing the well-being of animals. However, veterinary careers aren’t without stress, and mental health care is often lacking for professionals in the field.
Mobile teams bring COVID-19 vaccines to rural villages in Sierra Leone
COVID-19 vaccination rates remain low in many African countries, often because providing access to vaccines is difficult in remote areas. A new international research project showed that intervention with mobile vaccination teams in Sierra Leone is an effective way of reaching rural populations to increase vaccination uptake.