Criteria and Procedures for Outstanding Student Oral/Poster Paper Awards
Hydrology Section, AGU
April 16, 1995
Modified Oct 31, 1996
Recognizing outstanding student papers at the spring and fall AGU meetings can give a real boost to those who are honored and encourage high-quality presentations among student participants. The goal is to recognize on the order of 5 percent of student papers as outstanding at each meeting. Based on 1994 numbers, that would give a the target of honoring up to six (6) student papers in the spring and up to eight (10) student papers in the fall as outstanding.
The aim is to recognize outstanding papers rather
than the best paper in a particular session. Thus
many sessions will have no outstanding papers,
while occasionally a session may have more than one
outstanding paper. The aim is also to recognize the
student, not the advisor or drafting department.
Greater emphasis will be placed on the presentation
than on the content; it is usually not possible to
distinguish how many of the ideas are those of the
student alone. In addition, comparing different
types of science can also be problematic (For
example, is a field program better than a modeling
activity?
II. Criteria
Download postcript version of criteria
The evaluation should be based on such things as timing, clarity of expression, effective use of illustrations, organization and logic. All of these are primarily or completely under control of the student. For presentation, a 1-5 scale will be used, with 1 = Poor, 2 = Fair, 3 = Good But Not Great, 4 = Consider for Award, and 5 = Award Winner. A summary of some of the key criteria is provided on the score sheet, which can be used along with comments to give the award committee a basis for your composite score. Things that should be included are:
1. Presentation of a talk:
Should be audible from rear of room, with reasonably clear
enunciation and absence of "um, er, you know" (some concession
could be made for nervousness, and for those who are not
native-English-speaking, but not too much). Time should be used
effectively; the introduction should not take half the time with
results crammed into the last minute. Points should be deducted
for running more than a minute over maximum time, and extra
credit given if talk ends early with time for questions. The
student should have practiced the presentation often enough to
have the timing right, so there is no excuse for running over.
Slides/viewgraphs should be legible from the back of room,
well-labeled, and not overcrowded. The main point of the figure
should be obvious without explanation. There should not be too
many slides; points should be deducted for large data tables or
multiple graphs on one figure. If there are questions, the
student should handle them with some poise, should understand the
point of the question and be able to answer it.
2. Presentation of a poster:
Students should, again, be able to speak clearly - no "um, er,
you know." They should tell you enough to explain
any item, without going into excessive detail
(unless you ask for it). They should explain the poster
logically, starting with background and going on to results and
conclusions. The figures need not be photographic quality, but
should be neat and legible. Poster should be logically arranged,
not just a lot of figures tacked up in no order. Title should be
from 3 meters away, and there should be an abstract or some short
summary for people who just want to read. Either too much text
or not enough are minuses. There should be some sort of summary
diagram or list of conclusions. The figures should be designed
to be informative in a poster context, not just copies of
something for publication.
Extra credit might be given for visually catchy set-up and use of color. Student should be able to handle poster alone; points should be deducted if he/she turns to the advisor for help. If the advisor attempts to take over, the judge should continue to address questions to the student.
3. Content of a talk:
Arrangement should be logical; it should explain the problem to
be addressed, describe methods (briefly), present results, and
draw explicit conclusions. Points should be deducted for
diverging into unnecessary details. The purpose of the study
should be clear, not just a description of data. At least one
conclusion should be reached, and substantiated by the data.
Although hard to do, try to assess whether student understands
the significance of the work, or is just parroting his/her
advisor. Study may not be earth-shaking, but should be elegant
and contribute something new to the field: useful new data, a new
model, a test of an old model. There should be evidence of
familiarity with the literature and work of others.
4. Content of a poster:
Same criteria as for a talk. Data should be enough to support
conclusions but not too much- a few results that show the trend
are better than trying to show every single piece of data.
Either verbally or visually, there should be a statement of the
problem and of the conclusions. With a poster it is easier to
determine whether student understands the work.
Eligibility Note: AGU provides a list of student presentations at
each meeting. If you believe a student presentation has been
omitted from our list, go ahead and judge the presentation, and
the committee will sort out eligibility later. Previous winners
are not eligible for a second award. Students who are currently
postdocs are eligible ONLY if they are presenting work done as a
student and if the abstract was submitted while the person was a
student. When in doubt, judge the presentation and we'll confirm
student status later. Use the comment section of the judging
form to let us know of any eligibility concerns.
III. Procedures
1. Committee. Awards will be administered by an ad hoc committee of five to nine persons appointed by the section president for a two-year term, which is renewable. One person serves as committee chair and coordinates the overall program; this could be the section secretary. Each of the other four persons serves as the Awards Coordinator for one meeting during the two-year period. The committee makes actual award decisions for each meeting based on reports from judges.
2. Awards Coordinator. The awards coordinator for a given meeting will receive a list of eligible papers from the AGU staff, and makes a logistical plan for doing the judging. The main jobs of the awards coordinator will be to: i) recruit sufficient judges, ii) assign papers to judges, iii) preparing and distributing scoring sheets and instructions to judges, iv) collect and collate scoring sheets, and v) do the initial screening before the whole committee considers the scoring sheets. The entire committee should help the awards coordinator recruit judges.
3. Committee Chair. The chairperson of the Student Paper Awards Committee will be responsible for: i) notifying those students selected to receive awards, ii) see that AGU gets the necessary information on the students to be honored with awards, iii) make final decisions in the event of disagreements on the committee as to who should receive awards, iv) see that the section members are informed about the program, and v) assure the smooth functioning of the program. For notification in EOS, each student will need to write a short paragraph on his/her education and research and the subject of the talk; and provide a photo.
4. Judges. Judges should include the student paper awards committee, session chairs, and other roving judges. Special emphasis should be placed on recruiting recent graduates as judges. Session chairs and co-chairs should also be recruited as judges. Each judge is responsible to complete a standard scoring sheet for each paper (s)he is assigned, and return it to the awards coordinator at the end of the meeting. The judges will be encouraged to read the abstracts before the meeting. On the order of 50 roving judges should be recruited for the fall meeting, and 30 for the spring meeting.
5. Evaluation Procedure. Each eligible paper should be evaluated by at least two judges, including the session chair or co-chair (if recruited). Session chairs, co-chairs, judges and committee members are encouraged to complete evaluation forms on every eligible paper they see (not just those assigned). Equal weight should be given to oral and poster presentations.
It is desirable that at least one judge sit
through an entire session (or attend all posters)
to provide some standardization. Judges should
try to score each talk right after it is given
(or each poster before seeing the next) so that
several of them do not become blurred in their
minds. If there are several student papers in a
session, the judges should be asked to provide an
overall ranking for the session, as well as the
individual scoring sheets. The judge will
probably end up trying to give the most points
for what is thought to be the ``best" talk. To
get around this (or in case of a tie), judges
should be encouraged to provide suggestions for
``extra credit" or ``special considerations"
(``Even though Bill has a slightly higher score
than Jane, I thought Jane's talk was better,
though I can't quite verbalize it.").
IV. Check list for meeting coordinators
1. Get list of student papers registered at meeting from:
Wynetta Singhateh
wsinghateh@kosmos.agu.org
202-939-3223
2. Check for previous winners & eliminate
3. Get session chair list, including email and postal addresses
from current meeting chair.
4. Check for students as session chairs & eliminate
5. Hydrology Section President mails session chairs asking for help (This
has been done in the past. Need to check with Mary Anderson to see if
she still wants to follow this pattern.) Assume the answer is yes
unless you hear otherwise.
6. Contact sessions chairs and request their help judging. If
possible, the initial contact should be made by the program
chair, but this needs to be done very early; contact the program
chair to find out when their mailing goes out...probably shortly
after the PREVIOUS meeting. The sessions chairs could also
be asked for names of roving judges. In the Spring of 98 we
are asking the Program Chair to co-sign the request for help
to try to get a better response from this group of judges.
Mail session chairs list of students in their session. For poster
sessions, highlight selected names for judging. Keep in mind session
chairs without students or with a limited number of students may be
good judges in other sessions. Download example letter to
chairs.
7. Obtain lists of potential roving judging. Exclude names
of session chairs or others already contacted. Sources include: