2024 Student Paper Competition
Sponsored by the ASA Consortium of Sections (GSS/SRMS/SSS)
The Social Statistics Section (SSS), Government Statistics Section (GSS), and Survey Research Methods Section (SRMS) of ASA are pleased to announce a competition for student and post-graduate papers. Competition winners will present their papers at a topic-contributed session during the Joint Statistical Meetings (JSM), August 3 through August 8, 2024 in Portland, Oregon. Competition winners will also be highlighted during the 2024 SRMS, GSS, and SSS business meetings at JSM. A subsidy of up to $1,000 is provided to each winner to cover JSM 2024 expenses, and five awards will be granted. We ask faculty members as well as supervisors and mentors of recently-hired graduates to encourage students and mentees to apply for these awards.
Applications are due at 11:59 p.m. EST, December 15, 2023, and winners are notified within four weeks of that date.
Eligibility
To be eligible to participate, you must be a current undergraduate or graduate student at any level, or a recent 2023 graduate who wishes to present research that was conducted as a student. Previous student paper competition winners will not be eligible for this award.
Papers entered in this competition must involve either a new statistical methodology or a creative application of statistical analyses to a problem, issue, or policy question pertinent to the subject areas of one of the sponsoring sections. The research does not have to be complete, but competitors must be able to submit an abstract prospectus that describes the planned research and nature of the intended innovation(s).
More than twelve sections of ASA sponsor Student Paper Competition / Travel Awards to assist students with travel expenses to attend JSM. Students may submit papers to no more than two competitions and may accept only one section’s award. Students must inform all sections applied to when s/he wins and accepts an award, thereby removing the student from the award competition for the other section.
Application Process
Applications must include:
- A cover letter with the applicant’s name, current affiliation and status, and contact information (address, telephone, email);
- An abstract (300 words maximum);
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A draft paper no longer than 25 pages (inclusive of all figures, tables, and bibliography), entirely double-spaced (abstract, main body, references, footnotes, and appendices), and using at least 12-point type throughout with at least 1-inch margins on all sides;
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A letter from their adviser that certifies the applicant’s status (e.g., current student or new graduate who completed the degree within the past year), and describes plans to complete the research.
To apply, please email the package containing the first three items above (the adviser letter should be sent separately by the adviser) to all the 2024 section officers listed below:
• Maria Cuellar (SSS Program Chair-Elect, mcuellar@sas.upenn.edu)
• Chris Moriarity (SRMS Program Chair-Elect, cdm7@cdc.gov)
• Darcy Steeg Morris (GSS Program Chair-Elect, darcy.steeg.morris@census.gov)
Deadlines
Please note the tight turnaround times in December 2023 - January 2024 for notifications and submissions, and plan to be available and responsive:
1. Applicants email the application package to the three program chairs-elect by 11:59 p.m. EST on December 15, 2023.
2. Competition winners are notified by January 15, 2024.
3. Competition winners must confirm their acceptance of the award, and immediately inform other sections that they applied to by January 20, 2024. Failure to confirm the award may lead to removal from the list of winners.
4. Competition winners submit their winning paper abstract through the regular JSM abstract submission process by February 1, 2024. (Winners will be provided with the ID number of the topic-contributed session at which they will deliver their presentations.)
5. Competition winners come to the JSM in Portland, Oregon in August 2024 to present their winning papers!
2023 Award Recipients
Five winning papers were presented at JSM 2023. The 2023 award recipients are:
- Elizabeth Bersson, Duke University, Department of Statistical Science
- Yuke Wang, Georgia State University, Department of Mathematics and Statistics
- Yi Zhang, Harvard University, Department of Statistics
- Melody Huang, University of California, Berkeley, Political Science and Statistics
- Rahul Singh, MIT, Department of Economics
Award recipient information can be found on the SRMS website.