Analyze all the format requirements for completing a research project at your undergraduate institution. Different universities and colleges have different requirements, such as minimum length, citation format and timeline of completion, in order to produce an acceptable project.
Identify a topic related to your specific major. Typically, research proposals respond to some problem or issue within a major. Occasionally, undergraduate instructors or advisors will provide a prompting problem, topic or question to which an undergrad research project can respond.
Articulate a specific research question to which your research project can respond. Your research question should be open-ended so that it can elicit a variety of different responses beyond a simple "yes" or "no."
Locate a variety of primary and secondary resources in an effort to answer your open-ended research question. Primary materials include first-hand accounts, research studies and interviews. Secondary materials include peer-reviewed critical and analytical texts that attempt to make sense of primary materials.
Compose an abstract for your proposal. The abstract should break down into three paragraphs. The first paragraph demonstrates how contemporary research frames the problem your proposal will address. The second paragraph clearly articulates the question your research will address, as well as how and why that question is significant for the field in which your proposal is situated. The final paragraph outlines your plan for responding to the research question, structuring your proposal and completing the project. The abstract acts as both a summary and a guideline for your proposal.
Outline a superstructure for your proposal. In addition to the abstract, your proposal will need the following sections: an introduction forecasting the contents of the proposal, objectives indicating what your proposal and research project will accomplish, a problem statement fully describing and contextualizing the problem your project hopes to answer, a solution statement articulating the researched solution your project yields, an outline of the methodology you will use during the course of your project, a list of the resources you will need to complete your project, the schedule of your project's completion, and a conclusion summarizing the sections of your proposal.