Course-embedded undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) improve student learning, engagement, and retention in STEM disciplines. However, due to limited research support, undergraduate educators at primarily-teaching institutions are at a disadvantage when implementing such state-of-the-art practices. Nation-wide models provide accessible CURE options that address this disparity, but alternative models that benefit from the intimate faculty-student relationships that exist at teaching-focused colleges are also possible. A collaboration between an investigator at an R1 institution, Emory University, and a nearby teaching-focused college, Oglethorpe University, resulted in the design of a novel “Pipeline” CURE strategy that is a fusion of the apprentice- and cohort-style of undergraduate research and that can be implemented with basic laboratory infrastructure. Because Oglethorpe Biology majors take more than one course with an instructor, the faculty can build concept sophistication over time in a deliberately developmental manner. The “Pipeline” CURE applies the same sensibilities to laboratory work: over the course of four-years, students are incrementally trained through laboratory activities themed around the R1 investigator’s laboratory focus: stem cell reprogramming in C. elegans. Students are introduced to nematode husbandry and behavior in Introductory Biology; as sophomores they use C. elegans in a linkage project in Genetics. In an upper-level class, students apply these skills in performing novel genetic screens germane to the R1 laboratory’s research agenda. Under these circumstances, the R1 investigator can pilot high-risk inquiries that could spin-off into fruitful projects for graduate students/fellows. Although we have yet to produce a cohort that has completed a full pipeline, the foundations for this model are in place. In the fall of 2015, C. elegans modules were included in Introductory Biology and in Genetics with the idea that a fully-trained cohort will emerge from the pipeline in 2017. We have also incorporated class-wide RNAi screens for candidate enhancers/suppressors of a sterility defect, into the laboratory portions of two Developmental Biology offerings (2014 and 2016; 14 and 19 students, respectively). Anecdotal remarks indicated that students were engaged and enthusiastic about their involvement in authentic research. We also learned several logistical lessons for more fluid implementation in future iterations. The results of the 2016 cohort, including responses to indirect attitudinal surveys and direct performance evaluations are pending completion of the current academic term. If these trials prove effective at supporting students’ interactions with the Biology curriculum, the “Pipeline” CURE approach may prove applicable to other teaching-focused/research-based academic alliances.