Outstanding Dissertation Award

We are excited to announce the SIGCHI Outstanding Dissertation Award, which will recognize the most outstanding research contributions from recently graduated PhD students within the HCI community, showcasing the quality and impact of HCI research.

Important Dates

Submission Deadline: December 15 Awards Announced: February

Eligibility

• Eligible dissertations must have been successfully completed between September 1, the previous year and August 31, the current year. An award date that is appropriate to the candidate’s institution is acceptable, for example graduation date, examination date, or final thesis acceptance date.

• Candidates will only be eligible to submit once for this award.

• The candidate must be a SIGCHI member.

• Only dissertations written in English will be considered. If a dissertation originally was written in another language, a translation into English is acceptable and can be considered.

• The candidate must have published at least one paper in a “paper venue” (e.g., a full paper or a note) of any length (but not an abstract to support a workshop or other non-paper venue) at a SIGCHI Sponsored or Co-Sponsored conference (see https://sigchi.org/conferences/upcoming/) or an ACM-sponsored HCI journal.

• Each nominated dissertation must be on a topic relevant to HCI. The determination of whether a dissertation is within scope for the award will be made by the SIGCHI Outstanding Dissertation Award Committee. A dissertation can be nominated for both the SIGCHI Outstanding Dissertation Award and the ACM Doctoral Dissertation Award.

• Only one nomination may be submitted per department.

Preparing and Submitting

All nomination materials must be submitted by the submission deadline to this online form. Submissions must be submitted in English. PDF format is preferred for textual materials. Supplementary materials must be multi-platform. Late submissions will not be considered.

Nomination for the award must include:

1. English language copy of dissertation.

2. Statement from an advisor limited to 2 pages addressing why the candidate’s dissertation should receive this award. This should address the significance of the dissertation, not simply repeat the information in the abstract. Nomination must come from the advisor; self-nomination is not allowed.

3. One letter of support limited to 2 pages. The supporting letter should be from an expert in the field who can provide additional insights or evidence of the dissertation’s impact. (The nominator/advisor may not write a letter of support.) If a letter-writer is supporting more than one nomination, they may be asked to rank those nominations.

4. List of publications contributing to the dissertation.

5. SIGCHI membership number for candidate.

6. Suggested citation if the candidate is selected. This should be a concise statement (maximum of 50 words) describing the key technical contribution for which the candidate merits this award. Note that the final wording for awardees will be at the discretion of the SIGCHI Outstanding Dissertation Award Committee.

Doctoral Award Review Process

Each submission will be reviewed by a panel of experts selected by the SIGCHI Executive Committee to evaluate the quality, contribution, and impact as demonstrated by the submitted thesis and supplementary materials.