research paper competition canada

Language selection

• Français fr

National Student Paper Competition

Connecting talented graduates with the Government of Canada

The 2023–2024 National Student Paper Competition is currently closed to new applications until further notice.

The National Student Paper Competition (NSPC) , an annual competition, offers a unique opportunity for talented graduate students to connect with senior public servants, expand their networks, nurture their leadership skills, and foster employment opportunities with the federal public service.

For more information about the competition or the submission process, contact the NSPC team at nspc‑cneu@csps‑efpc.gc.ca .

Background information

Launched in 2013, the NSPC is an annual competition organized by the Canada School of Public Service in partnership with the  Canadian Association of Programs in Public Administration  and the  Institute of Public Administration of Canada . The competition is also supported by various Canadian higher-education institutions and associations, including the  Canadian Association for Graduate Studies .

The aim of the competition is two-fold:

• introducing innovative ideas and bright new thinkers to the Canadian public service
• enhancing public service excellence and encouraging high performance

Benefits and outcomes of the competition

• A strong partnership between the federal public service, universities and higher-education associations that encourages graduate students to apply academic knowledge and skills to inform Canadian public policy and the Public Service of Canada.
• An increased number of promising graduate students in different fields of expertise across Canadian universities working with the federal public service and contributing with innovative, research-based ideas to enhance the lives of all Canadians.
• A talented, diverse, inclusive and modern workforce equipped with the skills needed to embrace new workplace challenges, design services, mobilize knowledge, and respond to the country's evolving needs.

Learn more about the benefits of this initiative:

Video: National Student Paper Competition Government executives and past winners highlight the benefits of the National Student Paper Competition.

The Grand Prize winner(s) of the competition will receive the following:

• A 4-month internship with the Canadian federal public service (staffing mechanism depends on individual situation)
• Invitations to attend or present at academic and governmental conferences and panels

The winner and the top five finalists will:

• receive a certificate of achievement signed by the President of the Canada School of Public Service
• have their paper posted on the  Canadian Association of Programs in Public Administration (CAPPA) website  in both official languages

Winner of the 10th National Student Paper Competition - Lydia Laflamme (2022‑2023) Lydia Laflamme, one of two winners of the 10th National Student Paper Competition, is a master's student in political science at Université Laval in Québec. She is a member of the Research Chair on Democracy and Parliamentary Institutions, the Université Laval Research Group in Politics and Cognition, and the Leadership Chair in the Teaching of Digital Social Sciences. Her main areas of research are political psychology and electoral politics in Quebec and the rest of Canada. More specifically, she studies intergroup conflict, the impact of identity on political attitudes, and the connections between voter well-being and behaviour. 

Visit the Canadian Association of Programs in Public Administration (CAPPA) to read the paper written by Lydia Laflamme.

Winner of the 10th National Student Paper Competition - David Jones (2022‑2023) David Jones, one of two winners of the 10th National Student Paper Competition, is a policy analyst and advisor, specializing in economics, healthcare and public policy. Currently, David is midway through the Master of Public Policy degree at the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy. He also studied Economics at the University of Cambridge. David is passionate about providing high-quality research, analysis and advice that both supports efficient policymaking and improves the welfare of society.

Visit the Canadian Association of Programs in Public Administration (CAPPA) to read the paper written by David Jones.

Video: Winner of the 9th National Student Paper Competition - Aisha Barkhad (2021-2022) Graduate student Aisha Barkhad, winner of the 9th National Student Paper Competition, answers a series of questions about her experience during and after the competition. 

Video: Winner of the 8th National Student Paper Competition - Bhajan Gill (2020-2021) Bhajan Gill, winner of the 8th National Student Paper Competition and currently a policy analyst with the Canada School of Public Service, answers a series of questions about her experience during and after the competition.

Visit the CAPPA website to learn more about the top papers from past editions of the NSPC.

Application process

• Are you a talented Canadian graduate student looking for an opportunity to apply your knowledge to advance the federal public service?
• Are you interested in building your network by connecting with senior officials in the Government of Canada?
• Do you have an inspiring and innovative idea that can improve a Canadian policy or program?

If you answered "yes" to any of these questions, consider applying to the NSPC.

• Canadian citizens or permanent residents of Canada
• Graduate (master's and PhD) students enrolled in a publicly funded Canadian university for at least one academic term during the 2023-2024 academic year, on a full-time or part-time basis
• Team applications, with a maximum of two members, are permitted, although, all members must meet the above requirements. A team application that includes collaborators from other universities is permitted.

The NSPC initiative is committed to contributing to a more equitable, diverse, and inclusive Canadian public service. We strongly encourage the participation of students from equity-seeking groups, including graduate students with disabilities, 2SLGBTQI+ students and BIPOC students.

If you are interested in participating in the NSPC, you should:

• Contact a professor or supervisor in your Canadian university department, program or faculty to seek support
• Submit the paper to the professor or supervisor, who should then complete the online application form and submit three versions of the paper.

The NSPC is designed to allow graduate students to share inspiring and innovative ideas on topics related to governance and the Public Service of Canada. Papers should focus on the current priorities and concerns of the Government of Canada. All submissions on any other issue relevant to the federal public service are also welcome. To understand our current priorities, see in particular:

• The Speech from the Throne , which identifies government-wide priorities or objectives
• The Clerk's Annual Report to the Prime Minister on the Public Service of Canada
• Various departmental plans and reports
• Ministerial mandate letters

More information is available on the websites of the Privy Council Office and the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat .

Each paper should be a forward-looking think piece that explores innovative ideas and approaches to help position Canada and Canadians for the coming decade through solutions delivered by the Government of Canada.

In determining the paper's topic, applicants may want to consider the following questions:

• What are your ideas about how to ensure that the public service is ready to meet the needs of the future?
• What are the major social, economic, technological and/or environmental challenges facing Canada in the next decade? What policy strategies should Canada pursue to address them?
• What emerging topics will have a significant impact on the federal public service and service excellence for Canadians?
• What would it take to move your idea from policy approval to implementation?

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Quality of life and the well-being of Canadians
• Ethics and Values in the Public Service
• Anti-racism, equity, diversity and inclusion
• Government and democracy
• Federalism in Canada
• Digital government and artificial intelligence
• Climate change and sustainable development
• Indigenous affairs and reconciliation
• Public administration innovation and partnerships
• Canadian policies and program improvement
• Geopolitics, trade and National Security
• Skills development and the future of work

Submitted papers must meet the following  technical requirements:

• A single-authored or co-authored paper, either in English or in French
• A new work or one adapted from an earlier original academic course or academic research work
• A maximum of 1500 words (excluding the cover page, bibliography, footnotes/endnotes, appendices or any tables, charts and figures)
• Essay format using any standard citation style
• cover page with the paper's title and word count
• author's name and email address
• university and program of study
• name and institutional email address of professor or supervisor who is submitting on behalf of their student
• Identical content to PDF version
• cover page with only the title of the paper and the word count. Do not include the author's name and university.
• 1. Find a professor or supervisor from your university program to endorse the paper and provide necessary information. (See application form.)
• 2. Define a topic for the paper based on the competition criteria.
• 3.1 The paper is a maximum of 1500 words, excluding the cover page, bibliography, footnotes/endnotes, appendices or any tables, charts and figures.
• 3.2 The paper follows an essay format.
• 3.3 The paper uses a standard citation style.
• 4.1 PDF format: A cover page formatted with cover page including title, author names, email addresses, word count, university, and author university program. Name and institutional email address of professor or supervisor.
• 4.2 MS Word format: A cover page formatted with cover page including title, author names, email addresses, word count, university, and author university program. Name and institutional email address of professor or supervisor.
• 4.3 MS Word format: A cover page with name of paper and word count only, omitting author name and university.

Evaluation process

The submitted papers will be evaluated using the matrix below.

After all submissions have been evaluated and the scores for each essay have been tallied, the authors of the five highest-scoring essays will be selected.

To determine the winner, the top five finalists will be asked to present their research to a panel of senior government executives. The panel will evaluate and rank the presentations to determine the winner based on their:

• articulation of knowledge and integrated skills
• ability to communicate, argue and defend innovative ideas
• confidence and collaborative interaction with the panellists
• willingness to propose meaningful policy recommendations to inform and enhance the federal public service and Canadian society

This competition is designed to remove barriers, ensure a fair assessment, and allow all candidates to fully demonstrate their competencies. Accommodation measures are available to applicants upon request by email or voluntary indication on the online submissions.

Event: Recognizing the Resilience of Indigenous Women and the 2SLGBTQIA+ Community

Event: GBA Plus in Action: Respect, Relationships, and Intersectional Leadership in Gwaii Haanas

Event: Privacy Awareness Week 2024: Navigating Privacy in the Digital Workplace

• GCLearning newsletter

• Skip to main content
• Skip to "About this site"
• Departments

Language selection

• Search and menus

Undergraduate Student Research Awards

The Undergraduate Student Research Awards (USRA) program supports more than 3,000 students annually and is administered jointly by Canada’s three granting agencies: the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC). Applications for the USRA program must be completed and submitted  to the Canadian institution where you wish to hold the award  through NSERC’s online system. Selected applications are submitted to NSERC by institutions. No USRA applications may be submitted directly to the agencies.

Presently, CIHR and SSHRC USRAs are exclusively for Black student researchers. Institutions are assigned a specific allocation for these awards, as outlined in the  Undergraduate Student Research Awards allocations  web page.

On this page

Important information, description, eligibility, value and duration of awards, location of tenure, supervision of the student at the institution, subject matter eligibility, san francisco declaration on research assessment, equity, diversity and inclusion, allocations, black student researchers, indigenous student researchers (for nserc only), application procedure, selection process, notification of results, payment of awards, travel allowances, use and disclosure of information.

• Undergraduate Student Research Awards allocations
• Frequently asked questions about USRAs

Undergraduate Student Research Awards (USRAs) are meant to nurture your interest and fully develop your potential for a research career in health, natural sciences and engineering, or social sciences and humanities. These awards are also meant to encourage you to undertake graduate studies by providing research work experience that complements your studies in an academic setting.

You are permitted to hold a USRA during a co-op placement. Your institution’s co-op office or USRA liaison officer (LO) may be able to assist you in finding a placement. LOs are institution administrators and usually work in your institution’s scholarship office.

To be eligible to  apply  for an award

• you must be a Canadian citizen, a permanent resident of Canada or a Protected Person under subsection 95(2) of the  Immigration and Refugee Protection Act  (Canada), as of the deadline date for applications at the institution
• you must be registered, as of the deadline date for applications at the institution, in a bachelor’s degree program at an eligible institution
• you must have obtained, over the previous years of study, a satisfactory cumulative average (normally at least B-; check with your institution)
• you cannot be currently enrolled in an undergraduate professional degree program in the health sciences (e.g., MD, DDS, BScN)  (does not apply for CIHR USRAs)
• you cannot be currently registered or have been previously registered, at any time, in a graduate program in the same field of study
• you cannot have completed all your degree requirements

CIHR and SSHRC USRAs are, at the present time, exclusively for Black student researchers. To be considered, you must self-identify as Black (see the Black student researchers section for more details).

In addition

• if you already hold a bachelor’s degree and are studying toward a second bachelor’s degree, you may still apply for this award
• you may hold only  one  USRA per fiscal year (April 1 to March 31)
• you may hold a maximum of  three USRAs  throughout your undergraduate career (regardless of the granting agency)

To  hold  an award

• you must have completed all course requirements for at least the first year of study (or two academic terms) of your bachelor’s degree
• you must have been registered in a bachelor’s degree program at the time of application and in at least one of the two terms immediately before holding the award
• you must be working full time in eligible research and development activities in your proposed field of research during tenure of the award
• you cannot be registered in a graduate program
• You may hold an award at any time during the year as permitted by your academic program.
• Tenure may start on a date acceptable to both you and your host institution.
• USRAs have a value of $6,000, and the host institution is required to supplement the award.
• The duration of the award is 14 to 16 weeks on a full-time basis.
• The activities conducted during the tenure of the USRA are governed by the agreements, including employment agreements (if applicable), you have with the host institution and the relevant terms and conditions of awards.
• The agency’s contribution is  paid directly to the host institution  and is included in the funds that you receive.

The USRA program makes no provision for sick leave or vacation, or for other types of interruptions. Should a USRA be interrupted or terminated early for any reason, the agencies must be informed immediately.

Without exception, USRAs are tenable only at eligible Canadian institutions with an assigned allocation. Awards must be held at the institution where the offer of award originates.

An eligible supervisor is a person authorized by the institution to independently supervise students. Your institution will decide if your proposed supervisor is eligible. You must work under the supervision of a person who has been approved by the institution.

NSERC, CIHR and SSHRC support and promote high-quality research in a wide variety of disciplines and areas, which are divided into broad fields of research (health, natural sciences and engineering, and social sciences and humanities). This includes research that bridges two or more disciplines or that requires the skills of several disciplines.

You must ensure that you are submitting your application to an institution that has an allocation for your selected agency (refer to the  Undergraduate Student Research Awards allocations  web page for a list of allocations by institution and by agency).

If the granting agency determines your application was submitted to the wrong agency based on the subject matter, it will be transferred accordingly (refer to Selecting the appropriate federal granting agency web page for more information).

It is not necessary for your proposed supervisor’s research program to be exclusively within your selected agency’s field of study (health, natural sciences and engineering, or social sciences and humanities).

NSERC is a signatory to the  San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA) . To promote NSERC’s support of research excellence in Canada and incorporate the principles of DORA, NSERC has developed  Guidelines on the assessment of contributions to research, training and mentoring . The guidelines highlight NSERC’s commitment to excellence in research funding and aim to ensure that a wide range of research results and outcomes are considered and valued as part of the assessment process. 

The three agencies are acting on the evidence that achieving a more equitable, diverse and inclusive Canadian research enterprise is essential to creating the excellent, innovative and impactful research necessary to advance knowledge and understanding, and to respond to local, national and global challenges. This principle informs the commitments described in the  Tri-agency statement on equity, diversity and inclusion (EDI) and is aligned with the objectives of the Tri-agency EDI Action Plan .

When preparing the research proposal, supervisors are encouraged to consult the  NSERC guide on integrating equity, diversity and inclusion considerations in research web page.

Eligible Canadian institutions are assigned a separate allocation of awards to offer from each agency. Institutions must respect the agency-specific allocation of awards. Refer to the  Undergraduate Student Research Awards allocations  web page for a list of allocations by institution and by agency.

For NSERC:  Institutions may recommend applications from self-identified Black student researchers for USRAs beyond their allocation of awards.

For CIHR and SSHRC:  At the present time, CIHR and SSHRC USRAs are exclusively for Black student researchers. Institutions are assigned an allocation of awards, as outlined in the  Undergraduate Student Research Awards allocations  web page. To be eligible to apply for these awards, you must self-identify as Black by checking the relevant box within the application form. Note that this self-identification information will be shared with the institution to which you are applying and, if awarded, publicly. Refer to the  Instructions for completing an Undergraduate Student Research Awards (USRA) application – form 202  web page for more information.

Institutions may recommend applications from self-identified Indigenous student researchers for USRAs beyond their allocation of awards.

To apply for these awards, you must complete and submit an application using NSERC’s online system. Refer to the  Instructions for completing an Undergraduate Student Research Awards (USRA) application – form 202  web page for more information.

You can apply to more than one institution. You must apply directly to the institution where you would like to hold the award. However, please note that it is the institution’s choice whether to accept candidates from other institutions.

Eligible Canadian institutions are assigned an allocation of awards to offer each year. Refer to the  Undergraduate Student Research Awards allocations  web page for a list of allocations by institution and agency.  Note:  CIHR’s and SSHRC’s allocations are, at the present time, exclusively for Black student researchers.

The selection process of USRA applications will be carried out by institutions with an allocation and will be based on the following three selection criteria:

• academic excellence
• research potential
• expected quality of the training and mentorship to be received

All application and review processes are internal to the institution. It is the institution’s responsibility to establish its own selection criteria within the broad guidelines that the agencies provide. Institutions have the discretion to apply stricter selection criteria than those outlined above. When selecting students for awards, the institution will take into account the objectives of the USRA program. For details on the institution selection procedures, refer to the  Guidelines for Undergraduate Student Research Awards liaison officers or contact the USRA LO at the institution where you would like to hold the award.

Each eligible institution sets its own internal deadline dates for receiving applications. For information about these dates, contact the USRA LO at the institution where you intend to apply for an award.

Although awards may be held in the summer, fall or winter term, each institution will determine the number of selection processes it holds each year.

Each institution will inform applicants of its award decisions after it has completed its selection process. To find out if your application was recommended to the agencies, contact the USRA LO at your institution. Recommended candidates approved by NSERC and SSHRC will receive an award letter on SharePoint midway through their award. Recommended candidates approved by CIHR will receive an award letter by email. Award letters should be read carefully and kept for future reference.

Once the relevant agency has approved your USRA for tenure at one particular institution, you  may not  transfer it to another institution.

You will receive your payment from the institution. The institution will issue payments to you for the total value of the award in accordance with its pay procedures. It will also issue a T4 or T4A slip (statement of income) to you at the end of the calendar year.

NSERC, CIHR and SSHRC will pay their respective contributions directly to the institution.

Travel allowances are not provided by the granting agencies.

All personal information collected as part of this program is used by the agencies and by the relevant officials at the eligible research institutions to review applications and to administer and monitor awards. It may also be used to determine the most appropriate funding jurisdiction, or to monitor overlap in federal support. Details on the use and disclosure of this information by the agencies are described by CIHR on the Info source – Sources of federal government and employee information  web page, by NSERC on the  Use and disclosure of personal information provided to NSERC  web page, by SSHRC on the Collection, use and disclosure of personal information  web page and in the relevant program literature.

Each agency may publish the names and other limited award information of award holders on their websites in accordance with the agencies’ policies on disclosure under the  Access to Information Act  and their  Privacy Act  policies and guidelines related to the collection, use, retention and disposal of personal information. For more information, consult the Access to Information Act  and the Privacy Act .

For more details regarding CIHR’s use of personal information, refer to the Undergraduate Student Research Awards details on CIHR’s Funding Opportunity  web page.

The first point of contact regarding the USRA program should be the USRA LO at the institution where you intend to apply for an award or where you are currently registered in an eligible program of study.

For general information about the USRA program, policies and guidelines contact NSERC staff by email at  [email protected] .

For post-awards inquiries

• to CIHR, contact [email protected]
• to SSHRC, contact [email protected]

Tri-agency logos

Contact Newsletter

Get highlights of things happening at NSERC delivered to your email inbox. View all Newsletters

TOP OF PAGE

Modified: 2024-01-16

The International Space Solar Power Student Project Competition

Language selection

• Français fr

2023 Building better financial futures challenge

From: Financial Consumer Agency of Canada

The Building Better Financial Futures Challenge is a post-secondary student paper competition designed to promote the creation of actionable, evidence-based, solutions to current financial challenges faced by vulnerable communities.

The 2023 Building Better Financial Futures Challenge has now closed. The 2024 Building Better Financial Futures Challenge is now open for submissions.

Outcome: A top and runner-up paper were each selected from the undergraduate and graduate categories.

Selected Papers

Graduate category.

Top: Improving financial literacy education for Canadian youth in remote regions: Professional development and support for teachers

Author: Stephanie Dean

Affiliation: Faculty of Education & Social Work, Thompson Rivers University

Summary: Canadian youth who live in remote regions have less access to professional financial resources and support. The paper proposes a professional development program to train high-school teachers in remote regions on financial concepts, products, and services.

Runner-up: Measuring financial literacy to understand preparedness for retirement

Author: Ekaterina Kalantyrski

Affiliation: Gordon S. Lang School of Business and Economics, University of Guelph

Summary: Many Canadians are not investing enough for the kind of retirement that they would prefer. This paper proposes the development of a retirement-related financial literacy measure that will help to determine to what degree a consumer is prepared for their retirement.

Undergraduate Category

Top: Pedagogical solution to financial illiteracy in Canada: Increasing the accessibility of higher education

Authors: Hannah Muriel Robb Burrows & Floor Nusselder

Affiliation: Department of Psychology, Queen’s University

Summary: To reduce financial barriers that discourage individuals from accessing higher education, this paper proposes a module-based financial application program that strives to inform high school students about available financial aid and scholarships. Through the proposed program, students will learn the necessary financial literacy and application skills that may change intentions about enrolling in higher education (particularly for low-income individuals), in addition to benefits such as the importance of savings, ultimately having downstream effects that improve overall financial literacy rates.

Runner-up: 23% and counting, but not ‘one size fits all’: Helping Canada’s immigrants strengthen their financial knowledge

Author: Avneet Bhabra

Affiliation: Desautels Faculty of Management, McGill University

Summary: Newcomers to Canada make up 23% of the total population —a population that will continue to grow rapidly. To promote newcomer’s inclusion within the Canadian financial system, the paper proposes the integration of multilingual chatbots on banking websites (e.g., translating into the most common languages spoken by newcomers) as well as the adoption of a goals-based financial literacy curriculum that focuses on long-term savings goals.

Any findings, views or opinions expressed in the papers are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada, or the policy or position of any department of the Government of Canada.

Page details

Canadian Association of Programs in Public Administration

Winner of 9th National Student Paper Competition 2021-2022

The winner of 9 th  National Student Paper Competition 2021-2022 has been identified!

  The School, in collaboration with the Canadian Association of Programs in Public Administration (CAPPA) and the Institute of Public Administration of Canada (IPAC), is proud to announce that this year, the winner of the 9 th  Annual National Student Paper Competition is  Aisha Barkhad  from McMaster University for the paper  Climate change, globalization, and inequality: How vector-borne infectious diseases are threatening human health in Canada.

The winner paper along with other finalist papers are available here:

Aisha Barkhad (Winner)

Climate change, globalization, and inequality How vector-borne infectious diseases are threatening human health in Canada (Aisha Barkhad)

Dina Idriss-Wheeler and Karine Coen-Sanchez (Finalists)

Canada needs a national strategy for disaggregated race-based data to ensure equitable decision-making in health (Dina Idriss-Wheeler and Karine Coen-Sanchez)

Mathieu Geneau (Finalist)

Artificial Intelligence in Mental Health Services translated version (Mathieu Geneau)

Philippe Evoy (Finalist)

Diplomacy By Videoconference Challenges And Potential Solutions translated version (Philippe Evoy)

• Venue: Virtual Event
• Sponsorship Details
• Diversity and Inclusion
• Code of Conduct
• Student Support
• Registration
• Author Information
• Presenter Information
• Complete Program
• Your Program
• Artifact Evaluation
• Doctoral Symposium
• Industry Showcase
• Journal-first Papers
• Late Breaking Results
• Research Papers
• Social/Networking
• Student Research Competition
• Student Volunteers
• Tool Demonstrations
• [Workshop] A-Mobile
• [Workshop] ASE4Games 2021
• [Workshop] AeSIR 2021
• [Workshop] HCSE&CS
• [Workshop] IWoR2021
• [Workshop] NLP-SEA
• [Workshop] RAISE2021
• [Workshop] SUSTAIN-SE
• ASE 2021 Committees
• Organizing Committee
• Track Committees
• Artifact Evaluation Chair
• Program Committee
• Doctoral Symposium Chair
• Industry showcases Chair
• Late Breaking Results Chair
• NIER Chairs
• Research Papers Chair
• Student Research Competition Chair
• Tool Demonstrations Chair
• Contributors
• People Index
• Past Editions

Student Research Competition ASE 2021

Accepted papers.

The ACM Student Research Competition (SRC) offers undergraduate and graduate students a unique forum to showcase their research, exchange ideas, and improve their communication skills while competing for prizes at ASE 2021. The ASE SRC consists of a research abstract submission and a presentation competition during the conference. The winners of the competition at the ASE conference will get prizes and the first-place winners will be invited to participate in the ACM Student Research Competition Grand Finals to compete with winners from SRC held at other conferences during the calendar year.

Call for Contributions

Eligibility.

• To participate in the Student Research Competition (SRC), you must be an undergraduate or graduate student pursuing an academic degree at the time of initial submission.
• If you are considering submitting your existing work to SRC which has accepted or is currently under review in other venues or other tracks, we encourage you to add some novel parts other than the existing content to be considered in the competition.
• Supervisors of the work may not be listed as co-authors; for the competition, you should submit a single-authored version of your work.

How to Participate: Submit a Research Abstract

To participate in the competition, you should submit an extended research abstract related to the main ASE themes. The extended research abstract should discuss:

• research problem and motivation for the work
• background and related work
• approach and uniqueness
• results and contributions

The extended abstract must not exceed 2 pages, including all text, appendices, and figures. An additional third page is permitted only if it contains only references.  All submissions must be in PDF format and conform, at time of submission, to the IEEE Conference Proceedings Formatting Guidelines (title in 24pt font and full text in 10pt type, LaTeX users must use \documentclass[10pt,conference]{IEEEtran} without including the compsoc or compsocconf option).

You must submit your SRC research abstract electronically using the submission page:  ASE 2021 SRC HotCRP submission site . The review process is single-blind, i.e., the author names are visible to the reviewers.

The SRC committee members will review the submissions and select students to participate in the competition. Submissions that are accepted to the competition will be published in the ASE conference proceedings.

Competition: Presentation

If you are selected to participate in the competition, you will be invited to give a short presentation of your research to a panel of judges, which will take place virtually at ASE 2021. You will present a poster describing your work to conference attendees and leading experts in the Software Engineering field, including the SRC committee. Judges will review the posters and discuss the research with participants. After each presentation, there will be a brief question-and-answer session. The judges will evaluate the novelty and significance of your research, and the quality of your presentation, including your poster and the discussion around it. Your evaluation will be based on your knowledge of your research area, the contribution of your research, and the quality of your oral and visual presentation.

Prizes and SRC Grand Finals

The top three winners in each category (undergraduate and graduate) will be recognized during the conference and will receive prizes of US$500, US$300, and US$200, respectively.

The first-place winners of the ASE SRC are invited to compete with winners from other conferences in the ACM Student Research Competition Grand Finals. A separate panel of judges will evaluate all SRC Grand Final participants via the Web. Three undergraduate and three graduate students will be chosen as the SRC Grand Finals winners. They will be invited, along with their advisors, to the annual ACM Awards Banquet, where they will receive formal recognition.

After acceptance, the list of paper authors can not be changed under any circumstances and the list of authors on camera-ready papers must be identical to those on submitted papers. After acceptance paper titles can not be changed except by permission of the Track Chairs, and only then when referees recommended a change for clarity or accuracy with paper content.

SRC Frequently Asked Questions

Q: I am a PhD student. Am I eligible to participate in the SRC?

Yes. As a PhD student, you will compete in the Graduate category of the competition.

Q: What criteria will be used to evaluate the poster and conference presentations?

The judges will assess the poster presentations using the following criteria: Oral presentation, Visual presentation, Research methods, and Significance of contribution. For the conference presentation, the evaluation criteria are Knowledge of research area, Contribution of research, and Presentation.

Q: My research is not related to software engineering or any of the main themes of the ASE conference. Can I still participate in the Student Research Competition?

Yes, but not at ASE. To participate in the competition at ASE, your research needs to be related to the main themes of the ASE conference (see the topics for the main conference track). If your research is not among the topics relevant for ASE, please check the list of  current SRC calls  to find a conference that is better related.

Q: Does my extended abstract get published in the proceedings?

It depends if you are interested to publish your extended abstract. We will shortlist a list of accepted extended abstracts and the interested authors can submit their camera-ready before the camera-ready deadline to be able to publish their research. Or you can just decide to participate in the competition without publishing your research.

Additional Information

For additional information, consult the  ACM Student Research Competition  website or contact the ASE SRC chairs  Dr Xuan Bach D. Le and Dr Catia Trubiani

Program Display Configuration

Tue 16 nov displayed time zone: hobart change.

Xuan Bach D. Le Student Research Competition Chair

The university of melbourne.

Catia Trubiani Student Research Competition Chair

Gran sasso science institute.

Barbora Buhnova

Masaryk university.

Christos Tsigkanos

Ferdian Thung

Singapore management university.

Gabriele Bavota

Software institute, usi università della svizzera italiana, switzerland.

Grace Lewis

Carnegie mellon software engineering institute, united states.

Leonardo Mariani

University of milano-bicocca.

Martina Maggio

Saarland university, germany / lund university, sweden.

Quang Loc Le

University college london, united kingdom.

Radu Calinescu

University of york, uk.

Sergey Mechtaev

Toby Murray

University of melbourne.

Weiyi Shang

Concordia university.

Huawei Software Engineering Application Technology Lab

Queens University, Kingston, Canada

• Preliminary Round Deadline: August 24, 2022
• Finalists Announced: September 7, 2022
• Final Round Deadline: September 28, 2022
• Publication: October 12, 2022
• Humanities: Classics, History, Literature, Linguistics, Performing Arts, Philosophy, Religion, Anthropology, Music
• Social Sciences: Sociology, International Relations, Economics, Public Policy, Psychology, Education, Communication, Public Health, Law, Journalism, Environmental Policy, Business

Student Paper Competition

Description Application Process Student Paper Competition Winners

Description

Each year CORS conducts a student paper competition to recognize the contribution of a paper either directly to the field of operational research through the development of methodology or to another field through the application of operational research. The competition serves to showcase the high quality of OR education in Canada as well as the excellence of the new generation of operational researchers. Prizes are awarded in two categories: Undergraduate and Open.

Requirements

The applicant must be enrolled as a full-time student in a Canadian institution, in an undergraduate, masters, or PhD program during the school year 2023–2024 . Canadians who are studying outside of Canada are also eligible. Papers for which all applicants are undergraduates may be submitted to either category: Open or Undergraduate, but not to both. Papers for which some authors are graduate students must be submitted to the Open category. MBA students (and other specialized master students) must submit to the Open category with their applied projects. Published papers are eligible for the competition only if their initial submission date (for publication) is after the previous year's CORS Annual Conference.

Supervisors and industry partners may appear as coauthors on the paper, but the first authors must be the applicants. The applicants must have made substantial contribution to the project and have written the paper with only minor editorial assistance. If the paper includes such non-student authors, the supervisor should include information about the roles of the various authors when confirming the eligibility of the students.

Application Process

We thank you for your interest. Applications are no longer accepted for 2024.

Open Category

Open category chair, undergraduate category.

Application deadline: 1 April 2024 For further details and application instructions, please visit our submission website at: https://site.pheedloop.com/event/cors2024/home and select "Student Paper Competition".

Undergraduate Category Chair

All competitors should apply for CORS student funding by the deadline in case they become a finalist.

Entry Requirements

1. Abstract of 200 words or less. Author's name, address, and email address. Make sure the abstract clearly highlights the motivation, contribution, and potential impact of the paper. 2. Academic institution and supervisor's name, if applicable. 3. Note that papers selected as finalists must be presented at the conference to further be considered for first prize or honourable mention. 4. A PDF copy of the paper: - No longer than 35 pages (with minimum 1-inch margins, maximum 34 lines per page, and minimum font size of Times 11) including all figures, tables, appendices, and references. - The submitted paper must not contain any information identifying the authors or their institutions. 5. An email from the supervisor attesting that the participant is indeed the first author of the article submitted to the competition must be sent to the competition chair. Supervisors must agree to be part of the competition's arbitration committee, which requires the evaluation of three competition documents in April. If this is not possible, the supervisor should designate an appropriate alternate member of the committee.

Selection Criteria

• Contribution of the paper either directly to the field of operational research through the development of methodology or to another field through the application of operational research
• Originality
• Writing style, clarity, organization, and conciseness of the paper
• Prizes are awarded per paper. The cheque is sent to the first author, and allocation of prize money is up to the co-authors.
• Open Category: First Prize $500, Honorable Mention $100. One award per team.
• Undergraduate Category: First Prize $200, Honorable Mention $50. One award per team.
• All papers selected as finalists receive a certificate.
• If an undergraduate student wins the Open Competition, no undergraduate prize will be awarded. Honourable mentions will be provided if there is no winner.

Student Paper Competition Winners

Setareh Farajollahzadeh (University of Toronto)

Federico Bobbio (University of Montreal)

Bo Lin (University of Toronto)

Scholar Sun (University of Waterloo)

Jenya Sourgaeva, Angelika Nowlan, Sanjay Alwani, Weiyi Liu (Simon Fraser University)

Ian Yihang Zhu

Saman Lagzi

Ethan Baron

Kevin He, Lacey Liang, Sherlyn Ng, Viet Trinh, Ashutosh Dubal

Nasrin Yousefi

Aliaa Alnaggar

Theodore Morissette, Eric Entz, Andrew Veldhuis, Razi Sayed

Imad Mechmachi, Philippe Lavoie, Reda Kzaz, Jean-Yves Potvin

Margarita Castro

Sarah McCurdy, Meghan Stronach, Allison Jacobs, Alyssa Hopkins

Lucy Fountain

Christian Bingane, Miguel Anjos, Sébastien Le Digabel

Gabriel Jarry-Bolduc, Warren Hare

Milan Kaur, Mandeep Hanspal, Jui Champaneri, Sathana Srikanthan

Taghi Khaniyev

Gohram Baloch

Rafid Mahmood

Negin Bolkhanian, Matthew Reyers

Craig Fernandes

Seyed Doulabi

Gizem Nemutlu

Alexandra Hayes, Christian Gould, Kevin Chu, Srikajan Santhirakumaran

Amir Ardestani-Jaafari

Taha Mirza, Rupan Dandiwal, Shayan Altaf, Brady Lee

Oshane Jackson, Ismael Martinez

Brianna Horton, Constance Gervais, Danielle Shawcross, Juliana Gonzalez

Amir Rastpour

Vahid Roshanaei

Zahra Bodla, Ahad Ismail, Ra'd Daoud, AbdulRehman Shaheen

Jordan Moreau, Ian Gresel, Andrew Scott, Mohamed-Akeel R. Hasham

Auyon A. Siddiq

Vahid Sarhangian

Kishley Bhalla, Craig Mathews, W Brett Robinson, Katie Sclater

Nicole Mo, Alborz Namazi, Joyce Tai, Eric Yuen

Benny Wai, Alex Liu, Lawrence Huen

Bo Chen, Luheng Wang, Wenjiao Chen, Xiao Luo

Michael Jong Kim

Velibor Misic

Issac He, Mark Strange, Hans Aisake

Sam Maggs, Michelle Leung, Svyatoslav Glazyrin

Jonathan Y. Li

Mahmood Ebadian

Shuang E, Derek Hewitt, Jenny Morrow, Scott Van Bolhuis

Ramon Alanis

Bissan Ghaddar

Erin Hrycyschyn, Felicia Ng, Brent Ouwerkerk, Jimmie Tom, Sean Tomilin

Sachin Jayaswa

Mehmet A. Begen

Maxine Cunningham, John Schmidt, Jonathon Braamms

Mike Clay, Yvan Fortier, Chris Samuel

Chirag Surti

Sachin Jayaswal

Joe Naoum-Sawaya

Angela Kercher, Arthur Lee, Shawn Halvorson

Sterling Todd Keys, Sean Lelacheur, Greg Ninowsky

Fredik Odegaard

Anne Mercier

Navneet Vidyarthi

Allison Bouthillier, Amanda Meleshko, Peter Wares

Kieran Ryan, Stewart Wilson

Timothy C Y Chan

Catherine Gingras

Yong Yue Li

David Mann, Anh Nguyen, Sean O’Donnell

Megan Inglis, Jen Tyrkalo, Jillene Wiebe, Mark Zschocke

Jonathan Patrick

Pooja Pandey

Manish Verma

Chelsea Baron, Jennifer Der, Lukas Deeg, Mark Zschocke

John LaRusic

Oleksandr Romanko

Rémy Monfet

Alden Christianson, Wilson Mok, Gabriel Wong, Kelly O’Byrne

Daniel Bowker, Jared Poplawski, Scott Knibbs

Matt Thompson

Fatma Gzara

Ernest Hongtu Wu

Ayako Watanabe

Adam Crowe, Andrea Denney, David Fath, Elaine Siu, Linda Tarshahani

W.T. Huh, R.O. Roundy

M. Albareda-Sambola, J.A. Diaz, E. Fernandez

S. Lapierre, A.B. Ruiz, P. Soriano

P. St-Louis, J.A. Ferland, B. Gendron

A. Benjamin, M. Noel, R. D'Ilio

K. Chong, M. Grewal, J. Loo

K. Bessette, J. Litchfield, J. Johnson, M. Riskin

Samir Elhedhli

Nathalie Perrier

Kyle Biswanger

Gregory Paradis

Brian Denton

Aaron Luntala Nsakanda

Ernest Urbanovich

Joey Cherdarchuk, Shahnoor Lalani, Kimberley Mik, Thaddeus Sim

Pascal Forget

Jason H. Goto

Jinliang Cheng, George Steiner, Paul Stephenson

Chris Goodwin, Joanne Kok, Steve Kabanuk

Laura Morrison, Les Stelmach, Mark Gannon

Moren Lévesque, Kenneth R. MacCrimmon

John T. Blake, Michael W. Carter

Jay Baraniecki, Chris Neuman, Laura Morrison

Steve Chamberland

Hélène Dufourd

David Sparling

Keith Willoughby

Mike MacDonald, Bernie Lee

© 2008-2024 CORS-SCRO

Summer 2024 Admissions Open Now. Sign up for upcoming live information sessions here (featuring former and current Admission Officers at Havard and UPenn).

Discourse, debate, and analysis

Cambridge re:think essay competition 2024.

Competition Opens: 15th January, 2024

Essay Submission Deadline: 10th May, 2024 Result Announcement: 20th June, 2024 Award Ceremony and Dinner at the University of Cambridge: 30th July, 2024

We welcome talented high school students from diverse educational settings worldwide to contribute their unique perspectives to the competition.

Entry to the competition is free.

About the Competition

The spirit of the Re:think essay competition is to encourage critical thinking and exploration of a wide range of thought-provoking and often controversial topics. The competition covers a diverse array of subjects, from historical and present issues to speculative future scenarios. Participants are invited to engage deeply with these topics, critically analysing their various facets and implications. It promotes intellectual exploration and encourages participants to challenge established norms and beliefs, presenting opportunities to envision alternative futures, consider the consequences of new technologies, and reevaluate longstanding traditions. 

Ultimately, our aim is to create a platform for students and scholars to share their perspectives on pressing issues of the past and future, with the hope of broadening our collective understanding and generating innovative solutions to contemporary challenges. This year’s competition aims to underscore the importance of discourse, debate, and critical analysis in addressing complex societal issues in nine areas, including:

Religion and Politics

Political science and law, linguistics, environment, sociology and philosophy, business and investment, public health and sustainability, biotechonology.

Artificial Intelligence 

Neuroengineering

2024 essay prompts.

This year, the essay prompts are contributed by distinguished professors from Harvard, Brown, UC Berkeley, Cambridge, Oxford, and MIT.

Essay Guidelines and Judging Criteria

Review general guidelines, format guidelines, eligibility, judging criteria.

Awards and Award Ceremony

Award winners will be invited to attend the Award Ceremony and Dinner hosted at the King’s College, University of Cambridge. The Dinner is free of charge for select award recipients.

Registration and Submission

Register a participant account today and submit your essay before the deadline.

Advisory Committee and Judging Panel

The Cambridge Re:think Essay Competition is guided by an esteemed Advisory Committee comprising distinguished academics and experts from elite universities worldwide. These committee members, drawn from prestigious institutions, such as Harvard, Cambridge, Oxford, and MIT, bring diverse expertise in various disciplines.

They play a pivotal role in shaping the competition, contributing their insights to curate the themes and framework. Their collective knowledge and scholarly guidance ensure the competition’s relevance, academic rigour, and intellectual depth, setting the stage for aspiring minds to engage with thought-provoking topics and ideas.

We are honoured to invite the following distinguished professors to contribute to this year’s competition.

The judging panel of the competition comprises leading researchers and professors from Harvard, MIT, Stanford, Cambridge, and Oxford, engaging in a strictly double blind review process.

Keynote Speeches by 10 Nobel Laureates

We are beyond excited to announce that multiple Nobel laureates have confirmed to attend and speak at this year’s ceremony on 30th July, 2024 .

They will each be delivering a keynote speech to the attendees. Some of them distinguished speakers will speak virtually, while others will attend and present in person and attend the Reception at Cambridge.

Why has religion remained a force in a secular world? 

Professor Commentary:

Arguably, the developed world has become more secular in the last century or so. The influence of Christianity, e.g. has diminished and people’s life worlds are less shaped by faith and allegiance to Churches. Conversely, arguments have persisted that hold that we live in a post-secular world. After all, religion – be it in terms of faith, transcendence, or meaning – may be seen as an alternative to a disenchanted world ruled by entirely profane criteria such as economic rationality, progressivism, or science. Is the revival of religion a pale reminder of a by-gone past or does it provide sources of hope for the future?

‘Religion in the Public Sphere’ by Jürgen Habermas (European Journal of Philosophy, 2006)

In this paper, philosopher Jürgen Habermas discusses the limits of church-state separation, emphasizing the significant contribution of religion to public discourse when translated into publicly accessible reasons.

‘Public Religions in the Modern World’ by José Casanova (University Of Chicago Press, 1994)

Sociologist José Casanova explores the global emergence of public religion, analyzing case studies from Catholicism and Protestantism in Spain, Poland, Brazil, and the USA, challenging traditional theories of secularization.

‘The Power of Religion in the Public Sphere’ by Judith Butler, Jürgen Habermas, Charles Taylor, and Cornel West (Edited by Eduardo Mendieta and Jonathan VanAntwerpen, Columbia University Press, 2011)

This collection features dialogues by prominent intellectuals on the role of religion in the public sphere, examining various approaches and their impacts on cultural, social, and political debates.

‘Rethinking Secularism’ by Craig Calhoun, Mark Juergensmeyer, and Jonathan VanAntwerpen (Oxford University Press, 2011)

An interdisciplinary examination of secularism, this book challenges traditional views, highlighting the complex relationship between religion and secularism in contemporary global politics.

‘God is Back: How the Global Rise of Faith is Changing the World’ by John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge (Penguin, 2010)

Micklethwait and Wooldridge argue for the coexistence of religion and modernity, suggesting that religious beliefs can contribute to a more open, tolerant, and peaceful modern world.

‘Multiculturalism’ by Tariq Modood (Polity Press, 2013)

Sociologist Tariq Modood emphasizes the importance of multiculturalism in integrating diverse identities, particularly in post-immigration contexts, and its role in shaping democratic citizenship.

‘God’s Agents: Biblical Publicity in Contemporary England’ by Matthew Engelke (University of California Press, 2013)

In this ethnographic study, Matthew Engelke explores how a group in England seeks to expand the role of religion in the public sphere, challenging perceptions of religion in post-secular England.

Gene therapy is a medical approach that treats or prevents disease by correcting the underlying genetic problem. Is gene therapy better than traditional medicines? What are the pros and cons of using gene therapy as a medicine? Is gene therapy justifiable?

Especially after Covid-19 mRNA vaccines, gene therapy is getting more and more interesting approach to cure. That’s why that could be interesting to think about. I believe that students will enjoy and learn a lot while they are investigating this topic.

The Hall at King’s College, Cambridge

The Hall was designed by William Wilkins in the 1820s and is considered one of the most magnificent halls of its era. The first High Table dinner in the Hall was held in February 1828, and ever since then, the splendid Hall has been where members of the college eat and where formal dinners have been held for centuries.

The Award Ceremony and Dinner will be held in the Hall in the evening of  30th July, 2024.

Stretching out down to the River Cam, the Back Lawn has one of the most iconic backdrop of King’s College Chapel. 

The early evening reception will be hosted on the Back Lawn with the iconic Chapel in the background (weather permitting). 

King’s College Chapel

With construction started in 1446 by Henry VI and took over a century to build, King’s College Chapel is one of the most iconic buildings in the world, and is a splendid example of late Gothic architecture. 

Attendees are also granted complimentary access to the King’s College Chapel before and during the event. 

Confirmed Nobel Laureates

Dr Thomas R. Cech

The nobel prize in chemistry 1989 , for the discovery of catalytic properties of rna.

Thomas Robert Cech is an American chemist who shared the 1989 Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Sidney Altman, for their discovery of the catalytic properties of RNA. Cech discovered that RNA could itself cut strands of RNA, suggesting that life might have started as RNA. He found that RNA can not only transmit instructions, but also that it can speed up the necessary reactions.

He also studied telomeres, and his lab discovered an enzyme, TERT (telomerase reverse transcriptase), which is part of the process of restoring telomeres after they are shortened during cell division.

As president of Howard Hughes Medical Institute, he promoted science education, and he teaches an undergraduate chemistry course at the University of Colorado

Sir Richard J. Roberts

The nobel prize in medicine 1993 .

F or the discovery of split genes

During 1969–1972, Sir Richard J. Roberts did postdoctoral research at Harvard University before moving to Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, where he was hired by James Dewey Watson, a co-discoverer of the structure of DNA and a fellow Nobel laureate. In this period he also visited the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology for the first time, working alongside Fred Sanger. In 1977, he published his discovery of RNA splicing. In 1992, he moved to New England Biolabs. The following year, he shared a Nobel Prize with his former colleague at Cold Spring Harbor Phillip Allen Sharp.

His discovery of the alternative splicing of genes, in particular, has had a profound impact on the study and applications of molecular biology. The realisation that individual genes could exist as separate, disconnected segments within longer strands of DNA first arose in his 1977 study of adenovirus, one of the viruses responsible for causing the common cold. Robert’s research in this field resulted in a fundamental shift in our understanding of genetics, and has led to the discovery of split genes in higher organisms, including human beings.

Dr Aaron Ciechanover

The nobel prize in chemistry 2004 .

F or the discovery of ubiquitin-mediated protein degradation

Aaron Ciechanover is one of Israel’s first Nobel Laureates in science, earning his Nobel Prize in 2004 for his work in ubiquitination. He is honored for playing a central role in the history of Israel and in the history of the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology.

Dr Ciechanover is currently a Technion Distinguished Research Professor in the Ruth and Bruce Rappaport Faculty of Medicine and Research Institute at the Technion. He is a member of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, the Russian Academy of Sciences and is a foreign associate of the United States National Academy of Sciences. In 2008, he was a visiting Distinguished Chair Professor at NCKU, Taiwan. As part of Shenzhen’s 13th Five-Year Plan funding research in emerging technologies and opening “Nobel laureate research labs”, in 2018 he opened the Ciechanover Institute of Precision and Regenerative Medicine at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen campus.

Dr Robert Lefkowitz

The nobel prize in chemistry 2012 .

F or the discovery of G protein-coupled receptors

Robert Joseph Lefkowitz is an American physician (internist and cardiologist) and biochemist. He is best known for his discoveries that reveal the inner workings of an important family G protein-coupled receptors, for which he was awarded the 2012 Nobel Prize for Chemistry with Brian Kobilka. He is currently an Investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute as well as a James B. Duke Professor of Medicine and Professor of Biochemistry and Chemistry at Duke University.

Dr Lefkowitz made a remarkable contribution in the mid-1980s when he and his colleagues cloned the gene first for the β-adrenergic receptor, and then rapidly thereafter, for a total of 8 adrenergic receptors (receptors for adrenaline and noradrenaline). This led to the seminal discovery that all GPCRs (which include the β-adrenergic receptor) have a very similar molecular structure. The structure is defined by an amino acid sequence which weaves its way back and forth across the plasma membrane seven times. Today we know that about 1,000 receptors in the human body belong to this same family. The importance of this is that all of these receptors use the same basic mechanisms so that pharmaceutical researchers now understand how to effectively target the largest receptor family in the human body. Today, as many as 30 to 50 percent of all prescription drugs are designed to “fit” like keys into the similarly structured locks of Dr Lefkowitz’ receptors—everything from anti-histamines to ulcer drugs to beta blockers that help relieve hypertension, angina and coronary disease.

Dr Lefkowitz is among the most highly cited researchers in the fields of biology, biochemistry, pharmacology, toxicology, and clinical medicine according to Thomson-ISI.

Dr Joachim Frank

The nobel prize in chemistry 2017 .

F or developing cryo-electron microscopy

Joachim Frank is a German-American biophysicist at Columbia University and a Nobel laureate. He is regarded as the founder of single-particle cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM), for which he shared the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2017 with Jacques Dubochet and Richard Henderson. He also made significant contributions to structure and function of the ribosome from bacteria and eukaryotes.

In 1975, Dr Frank was offered a position of senior research scientist in the Division of Laboratories and Research (now Wadsworth Center), New York State Department of Health,where he started working on single-particle approaches in electron microscopy. In 1985 he was appointed associate and then (1986) full professor at the newly formed Department of Biomedical Sciences of the University at Albany, State University of New York. In 1987 and 1994, he went on sabbaticals in Europe, one to work with Richard Henderson, Laboratory of Molecular Biology Medical Research Council in Cambridge and the other as a Humboldt Research Award winner with Kenneth C. Holmes, Max Planck Institute for Medical Research in Heidelberg. In 1998, Dr Frank was appointed investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI). Since 2003 he was also lecturer at Columbia University, and he joined Columbia University in 2008 as professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics and of biological sciences.

Dr Barry C. Barish

The nobel prize in physics 2017 .

For the decisive contributions to the detection of gravitational waves

Dr Barry Clark Barish is an American experimental physicist and Nobel Laureate. He is a Linde Professor of Physics, emeritus at California Institute of Technology and a leading expert on gravitational waves.

In 2017, Barish was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics along with Rainer Weiss and Kip Thorne “for decisive contributions to the LIGO detector and the observation of gravitational waves”. He said, “I didn’t know if I would succeed. I was afraid I would fail, but because I tried, I had a breakthrough.”

In 2018, he joined the faculty at University of California, Riverside, becoming the university’s second Nobel Prize winner on the faculty.

In the fall of 2023, he joined Stony Brook University as the inaugural President’s Distinguished Endowed Chair in Physics.

In 2023, Dr Barish was awarded the National Medal of Science by President Biden in a White House ceremony.

Dr Harvey J. Alter

The nobel prize in medicine 2020 .

For the discovery of Hepatitis C virus

Dr Harvey J. Alter is an American medical researcher, virologist, physician and Nobel Prize laureate, who is best known for his work that led to the discovery of the hepatitis C virus. Alter is the former chief of the infectious disease section and the associate director for research of the Department of Transfusion Medicine at the Warren Grant Magnuson Clinical Center in the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland. In the mid-1970s, Alter and his research team demonstrated that most post-transfusion hepatitis cases were not due to hepatitis A or hepatitis B viruses. Working independently, Alter and Edward Tabor, a scientist at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, proved through transmission studies in chimpanzees that a new form of hepatitis, initially called “non-A, non-B hepatitis” caused the infections, and that the causative agent was probably a virus. This work eventually led to the discovery of the hepatitis C virus in 1988, for which he shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2020 along with Michael Houghton and Charles M. Rice.

Dr Alter has received recognition for the research leading to the discovery of the virus that causes hepatitis C. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal, the highest award conferred to civilians in United States government public health service, and the 2000 Albert Lasker Award for Clinical Medical Research.

Dr Ardem Patapoutian

The nobel prize in medicine 2021 .

For discovering how pressure is translated into nerve impulses

Dr Ardem Patapoutian is an Lebanese-American molecular biologist, neuroscientist, and Nobel Prize laureate of Armenian descent. He is known for his work in characterising the PIEZO1, PIEZO2, and TRPM8 receptors that detect pressure, menthol, and temperature. Dr Patapoutian is a neuroscience professor and Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator at Scripps Research in La Jolla, California. In 2021, he won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine jointly with David Julius.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why should I participate in the Re:think essay competition? 

The Re:think Essay competition is meant to serve as fertile ground for honing writing skills, fostering critical thinking, and refining communication abilities. Winning or participating in reputable contests can lead to recognition, awards, scholarships, or even publication opportunities, elevating your academic profile for college applications and future endeavours. Moreover, these competitions facilitate intellectual growth by encouraging exploration of diverse topics, while also providing networking opportunities and exposure to peers, educators, and professionals. Beyond accolades, they instil confidence, prepare for higher education demands, and often allow you to contribute meaningfully to societal conversations or causes, making an impact with your ideas.

Who is eligible to enter the Re:think essay competition?  

As long as you’re currently attending high school, regardless of your location or background, you’re eligible to participate. We welcome students from diverse educational settings worldwide to contribute their unique perspectives to the competition.

Is there any entry fee for the competition? 

There is no entry fee for the competition. Waiving the entry fee for our essay competition demonstrates CCIR’s dedication to equity. CCIR believes everyone should have an equal chance to participate and showcase their talents, regardless of financial circumstances. Removing this barrier ensures a diverse pool of participants and emphasises merit and creativity over economic capacity, fostering a fair and inclusive environment for all contributors.

Subscribe for Competition Updates

If you are interested to receive latest information and updates of this year’s competition, please sign up here.

Get your ticket

Research Papers Competition

The Sloan Sports Analytics Conference showcases cutting-edge research that is frequently featured in top media outlets throughout the world and has even changed the way sports are analyzed. The Research Papers Competition is an ideal way to build your reputation within the field of sports analytics.

This year’s competition will feature six sports tracks – Basketball, Baseball, Soccer, Football, Business of Sports, and Other Sports.

Abstract Submissions for SSAC24 are now closed

Abstracts are selected based on the novelty, academic rigor, and impact of the research.

All submissions are required to be open-source and a link to the author's GitHub repository or other repository supporting the research will be required.

Please refer to our Research Papers Rules page for full details on the submission and evaluation process. We look forward to reading your contribution!

Competition Format

The competition consists of the following phases:

• Abstract Phase

Authors submit abstracts. Based on the judged merits of their abstract submissions, a select group of authors will be invited to submit full manuscripts.

• Full Manuscript Phase

Invited authors submit full manuscripts. Referees will evaluate every manuscript, and authors of the best submissions will be invited to give a presentation on their findings at the conference. The referees will also select a separate set of authors who will be invited to present their work during a poster session, as well as a final set of three authors to give a deep-dive of their work in an open-source workshop.

• Conference Phase I

     a. Presentations

Invited authors will present their findings during the first day of the conference. Based on the quality of the presentation and manuscript, one paper per sports track (see tracks below) and one wildcard will be selected to present at the conference in front of a panel of industry experts. The judge scores will be tabulated and the winners will be announced following presentations.

     b. Poster Competition

All posters selected for the conference will be entered into a competition for Best Poster, determined by a combination of a fan and judges vote during the weekend of the conference.

Note: this competition is independent of the presentation finals, and none of the posters will advance to the presentation finals.

Timeline (all times Eastern Time)

Abstract submission due – Oct. 01, 2023, 11:59 p.m. EST

Full paper requests sent out – Mid-October 2023

Full paper submission due (if selected) – Dec. 01, 2023, 11:59 p.m. EST

Finalists and posters announced – Mid-January 2024

Submission of poster (if selected) – Early-February 2024

Submission of presentation (if selected) – Mid-February 2024

Conference presentations (if selected) – Conference Day

Open-Source Requirement

For the Sloan Sports Analytics Conference, the Research Papers competition has been a tremendous opportunity for researchers to both share their work with the community and improve the application of analytics across sports. We are excited to continue requiring all papers to be open-source for SSAC 2024 to further the impact of the great work of researchers in the industry.

Open-source research helps advance our mission to democratize analytics in sports by allowing researchers to build on top of the models and methods of their peers, both amplifying the effect of their research and better enabling widespread adoption of their work. We strongly believe that continued research into sports analytics is what makes our games more exciting and participants more effective. 

All papers will be required to submit a link to the team's GitHub repository, or another open-source repository, with the data used to conduct the research. This should include any publicly available data or private data used in the research. For any private / proprietary data, please use your best judgement to anonymize any personal information before sharing publicly. The code running the models is not required to be submitted, but is encouraged, as it contributes to the communal spirit of open-source work by which researchers build off of each other's work to further the application of analytics across sports.

Sports Tracks

Based on abstract content, all submissions will be entered into one of the following Sports Tracks:

• Basketball – All submissions related to the sport of basketball.
• Baseball – All submissions related to the sport of baseball.
• Soccer – All submissions related to the sport of soccer.
• Football – All submissions related to the sport of American football.
• Business of Sports – All submissions related to the business of owning, managing, or marketing a sport, or to new technology or ideas which could change the face of the sport.
• Other Sports – All submissions related to the playing of a sport that is not included in the above Sports Tracks.

Abstract Guidelines

Abstract submissions should be submitted online, and must use the following guidelines:

• Abstracts must contain fewer than 500 words, including title and body.
• Abstracts may include up to two tables or figures combined (e.g.  1 figure and 1 table, or 2 tables).
• Each abstract should contain the following sections:
• Introduction – What question is this research trying to answer? Why is it an important question for the industry?
• Methods – Description of relevant statistical methods used, including data sources or data collection procedures
• Results – Description of actual (not promised) results along with relevant statistics
• Conclusion – The overall takeaway from the study, including how the results will impact the sports industry

Evaluation of Submissions

The conference seeks submissions that report research pertaining to the use of analytics in the sports industry. We are open to contributions ranging from evaluating players and game strategies, to examining the success factors for sports business. In the abstract and full paper submission process, research will be evaluated on, but not necessarily limited to, the following criteria:

• Novelty of research – Does the research provide interesting insight into new models or challenge existing beliefs?
• Academic rigor / validity of model – Are the methodologies of the model and results fundamentally sound and appropriate?
• Reproducibility – Can the model and results be replicated independently?
• Application – What are the applications or potential applications of the insights from the research?

In evaluating presentation finalists at the 2024 SSAC, the above factors will be supplemented by the following criteria, as judged by a panel of academics and industry executives from team management and sports business operations:

• Interest / impact – Is there significant interest in the proposed question in the field of study or the community at large? What are the benefits or impact of the model or application?

The Research Papers team will review all abstracts. The Review Committee will evaluate all manuscript submissions. The Review Committee consists of the Research Papers team, as well as academic professors and experts from top universities in fields including statistics, information sciences, and economics. The industry panel that makes the final winner selection will decide on the basis of the paper and the presentation at the 2024 Sloan Sports Analytics Conference. In these final evaluations, more weight will be given to the final presentation, specifically the highlighted application and impact of the research.

Conflict of Interest Policy

Our objective is to ensure an unbiased evaluation of submissions throughout the process. We are aware that members of the evaluation committee may have had relationships with authors who have submitted papers. When possible, potential conflicts of interest are avoided by minimizing the review of research by the following:

• Authors who have collaborated with the reviewer on previous submissions
• Current or former students who worked with the reviewer
• Colleagues from the same organization
• Any other previous relationships with the author that may prevent an unbiased evaluation of the paper

All potential conflicts of interest will be managed as best as possible while still maintaining the quality of the review process. Final reviews will occur without knowledge of the names of the authors.

Rights and Permissions

All authors retain ownership rights to the research and the right to publish the research after the conference. Upon submission, authors grant access to 42 Analytics to make their research available for public viewing online and in print, for conference use for the Sloan Sports Analytics Conference. Authors are responsible for obtaining permission from third parties to reprint copyrighted information such as data, tables, or figures that may be protected by copyright.

SSAC 2024 Research Papers & Authors Profiles

2024 research paper finalists, approaching in-venue quality tracking from broadcast video using generative ai.

Short Abstract: ‍ Over the last 25 years, soccer tracking data has provided a deeper understanding of the ways that players and teams play the game. Although traditional tracking systems require in-venue installation, there is a current push to track players remotely from broadcast footage. However, tracking data obtained from broadcast footage is inherently incomplete due to players being out of the broadcast camera’s field of vision. We address this issue in this paper, leveraging generative AI to predict highly accurate locations of the players for the large portions of games where they cannot be visually perceived.

Author(s): Harry Hughes

Harry Hughes is a doctoral student focusing on how modern artificial intelligence techniques can be applied to sports data. With an undergraduate degree in Software Engineering at the University of Queensland, he is currently working at Stats Perform developing the company's broadcast tracking system.

Michael Horton

Michael Stokl

Harshala Gammulle

Clinton Fookes

Sridha Sridharan

Sateesh Pedagadi

Patrick Lucey

Estimating NBA Team Shot Selection Efficiency from Aggregations of True, Continuous Shot Charts: A Generalized Additive Model Approach

Short Abstract: We develop a novel type of basketball shot chart, a true shot chart, that uses a generalized additive model (GAM) to estimate total shot proficiency continuously in the half-court as a continuous, 3-D surface ( https://sportdataviz.syr.edu/TrueShotChart/ ). Unlike conventional shot charts, which do not consider free throw scoring pursuant to a shot from a given location, true shot charts incorporate total points, from the field and free throw line, pursuant to each shot in an NBA game (from 2016-2022 in the study) toward improved explanatory power of offensive efficiency variation across NBA team-seasons. Whereas conventional shot charts show a league-wide three-point premium over the period of the data, true shot charts show a deepening dispremium since 2018, as the free throw rate for three-point attempts is substantially less than that for two-point attempts. Lastly, we develop a novel shot chart summary measure, shot selection efficiency, as the Pearson correlation between expected proportional volume and expected true points, from the field and free throw line, across the half court space; polynomial regression and XGBoost modeling suggest shot selection efficiency is not only win productive, but a “Moneyball” or partly supra-payroll source of wins.  

Author(s): Justin Ehrlich

Dr. Justin A. Ehrlich is an associate professor specializing in sport analytics, machine learning, and computer science. His diverse research spans virtual reality, 3D human pose estimation, advanced visualization, ranking and rating in sports, the business of sport, and the analysis of risks associated with developing Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) in football players. As a faculty member in Syracuse University's Big Data Cluster, Dr. Ehrlich continues to contribute significantly to the field, focusing on big data, rating and ranking methodologies, on-field performance analysis, and advanced shot charts and visualizations. His dedication to advancing sport analytics is evident in the breadth and impact of his research contributions, including innovative approaches to understanding and visualizing player performance on the field.

Shane Sanders

Dr. Shane Sanders is a Professor of Sport Analytics at Syracuse University and an author at sportquant.substack.com. During the summer months, Sanders has done extensive consulting on player acquisition in professional basketball and has published leading academic work in sports economics, statistics, and game theory.  In total, he has authored or co-authored 80+ articles in leading journals of these fields, as well as a popular economics book, The Economic Reason. His work has been cited on NPR, in USA Today, in a U.S. Supreme Court sports antitrust case, and other prominent outlets. When not thinking about himself, Sanders–along with his wife, Bhavneet–helps coach his older daughter, Simran, for various middle school spelling, math, and science pursuits. Last year, Simran qualified for and placed well at the Scripps National Spelling Bee. Sanders also helps coach his younger daughter, Nanki, in soccer skills and in her budding academic interests. Hailing from Zionsville, Indiana–”land of Brad Stevens”– Sanders and his brethren have always been disproportionately crazy about basketball. Under the influence of this so-called “hysteria,” his parents, Dennis and Debby, actually bought and maintained an old high school gym for two decades strong.

Feeling the Pressure: A Unified Framework for Automating Pass Rushing Statistics in NFL Games

Short Abstract: In spite of the importance of the pass rush in professional football, pass rushing statistics only include the final outcomes of a play, e.g., sack and pass-made. They do not capture the dynamics of the pass rush or fine-grained insights throughout a play on how much pressure a rusher generates during the rush. In this paper, we propose a unified framework that enables the estimation of defensive pressure scores throughout a play with high accuracy and performance for rusher and blocker identification, rusher-blocker match-up and pressure score estimation and show the real-world applications of our framework including enriched analytics.

Author(s): Sungmin Hong

Sungmin Hong is an Applied Scientist at Amazon Generative AI Innovation Center where he helps expedite the variety of use cases of AWS customers. Before joining Amazon, Sungmin was a postdoctoral research fellow at Harvard Medical School. He holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from New York University. Outside of work, Sungmin enjoys hiking, reading and cooking.

Laura Kulowski

Laura Kulowski is an Applied Scientist at Amazon’s Generative AI Innovation Center, where she works closely with customers to build generative AI solutions. She holds a PhD in Earth and Planetary Sciences from Harvard University. In her free time, Laura enjoys biking and skiing.

Dan Volk is a Data Scientist at the AWS Generative AI Innovation Center, where he leverages generative AI to create novel solutions to complex problems. He has ten years of experience in machine learning, deep learning and time-series analysis and holds a Master’s in Data Science from UC Berkeley. Outside of work, Dan is a backpacker, snowboarder, mountain biker, drummer, and lifelong fan of all Seattle sports. Bring back the Sonics!

Henry Wang is an Applied Scientist at the AWS Generative AI Innovation Center, where he builds innovative GenAI solutions and co-leads Sports vertical with Dan. He holds a Master’s in Computational Science and Engineering from Harvard University. Outside of work, he loves to play golf casually and compete in tennis at amateur level.

Keegan Abdoo  

Keegan Abdoo is a Manager of Research and Analytics in the Next Gen Stats department at the National Football League. He has helped build out the Next Gen Stats platform over the last six seasons and was promoted to his current role in January 2023. Coming from a background of charting football, Keegan has strived to expand the NGS toolbox to classify more schematic data. Outside of work, he enjoys skiing, live music, and exploring all of the great restaurants Los Angeles has to offer.

Conor McQuiston 

Conor McQuiston is a Research Analyst in the Next Gen Stats department at the National Football League. Since joining Next Gen Stats in October 2022, Conor has used his physics background to help the team to develop and communicate new tracking data metrics to NFL media and all 32 clubs. Prior to joining NGS, he interned as an analytics assistant with the Arizona Cardinals and as a football research intern with Pro Football Focus (PFF). Outside of work, he enjoys going to the beach, reading about history, and trying out new recipes.

Kyeong Hoon (Jonathan) Jung

Kyeong Hoon (Jonathan) Jung is a Principal Software Engineer at the National Football League. He has been with the Next Gen Stats team for the last eight years helping to build out the platform from streaming the raw data, building out microservices to process the data, to building API's that exposes the processed data. He has collaborated with the Amazon Machine Learning Solutions Lab in providing clean data for them to work with as well as providing domain knowledge about the data itself. Outside of work, he enjoys cycling in Los Angeles and hiking in the Sierras.

Mike Band is a Senior Manager of Research and Analytics for Next Gen Stats at the National Football League. Since joining the team in 2018, he has been responsible for ideation, development, and communication of key stats and insights derived from player-tracking data for fans, NFL broadcast partners, and the 32 clubs alike. Mike brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to the team with a master's degree in analytics from the University of Chicago, a bachelor's degree in sport management from the University of Florida, and experience in both the scouting department of the Minnesota Vikings and the recruiting department of Florida Gator Football.

Diego Socolinsky

Diego Socolinsky is a Senior Applied Science Manager with the AWS Generative AI Innovation Center, where he leads the delivery team for the Eastern US and Latin America regions. He has over twenty years of experience in machine learning and computer vision, and holds a PhD degree in mathematics from The Johns Hopkins University.

Measuring Individual Competitiveness and its Impact on Sporting Success

Short Abstract: Although the sports industry pours millions of dollars into understanding talent, we do not know: how to measure individuals’ attitudes towards competition, when these attitudes are formed, how they vary both within individuals over time and across individuals, and, more fundamentally, how important competitiveness is for sporting success. We measure competitiveness and answer these questions by leveraging a rich, dynamic panel dataset on hundreds of top young prospects from a renowned professional soccer academy during the decade leading up to professionalism. The ideas and methods are applicable to all other sports.

Author(s): Julene Palacios-Saracho

Born in Gorliz (Spain). Currently studying a joint degree BA in Business Economics and BSc in Industrial Engineering. I love two intersections: (1) between math, economics and engineering, and (2) between science and sports. Played my first game in Spain’s professional soccer leagues at age 15. My hobbies include reading science (particularly, physics) and music (soundtracks). I play soccer for Athletic Bilbao Women and I am a big fan of Athletic Bilbao.

Ander Palacios-Saracho

Born in Gorliz (Spain). Currently studying a BSc in Data Science and Artificial Intelligence. Fascinated by the power of data, analytics, and recent advances in technology to try to answer all types of scientific questions, in both the social and natural sciences. Hobbies include soccer, bodyboarding, and free-diving in underwater kelp forests to observe octopus. I am a big fan of Athletic Bilbao, Nottingham Forest, Liverpool FC, and Tadej Pogacar.

No More Throwing Darts at the Wall: Developing Fair Handicaps for Darts using a Markov Decision Process

Short Abstract: Darts is a popular sport that caters to players of all different abilities, and it is therefore common for opponents to have mismatched skill levels. Handicaps are useful interventions that address this mismatch, keeping the game competitive by increasing the weaker player’s chances of winning. However, the design of handicaps in darts has historically been a lot like “throwing darts at the wall” with no rigorous approach. To fill this gap, we develop a framework to model the game of darts with different handicaps, allowing us to evaluate current approaches and design a novel, fairer handicap system.

Author(s): Timothy C.Y. Chan

Timothy Chan is the Associate Vice-President and Vice-Provost, Strategic Initiatives at the University of Toronto, the Canada Research Chair in Novel Optimization and Analytics in Health, a Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, and a Senior Fellow of Massey College. His primary research interests are in operations research, optimization, and applied machine learning, with applications in healthcare, medicine, sustainability, and sports. Along with co-author Doug Fearing, he received the MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference research paper award in 2013. He recently got back into playing tennis and he is never going back.

Craig Fernandes

Craig Fernandes is a third-year Operations Research PhD Candidate and Vanier Scholar at the University of Toronto supervised by Profs. Timothy Chan and Ningyuan Chen. His research focuses on optimization, game theory & AI/ML techniques applied in economics, emerging markets, and sports. His research has been featured at MIT's Sloan Sports Analytics Conference (SSAC), the New England Symposium on Statistics in Sports (NESSIS), and the Sport Innovation (SPIN) Summit hosted by Own the Podium. He also previously worked as a research data scientist at Amazon and will be conducting a research visit this summer at Dartmouth College's Tuck School of Business. He picked up golf during the pandemic and is now an enthusiast.

Rachael Walker

Rachael Walker graduated from the University of Toronto with a BASc in Industrial Engineering and a minor in Artificial Intelligence Engineering. For her undergraduate thesis, she researched the application of stochastic optimization models in sports. Specifically, she examined how Markov models can be used to design fair handicap systems in the game of darts. Rachael recently started a new role on the data science team at the private equity firm Birch Hill Equity Partners. She is also an undeterred fan of the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Optimizing Baseball Fielder Positioning with Consideration for Adaptable Hitters

Short Abstract: This paper presents a novel approach to positioning baseball fielders to maximize expected outs or minimize expected runs allowed against an opposing hitter. We find evidence that our positioning approach is an improvement over MLB average positioning in terms of both hits and runs allowed. We then extend our approach to adaptable hitters who adjust their batted ball strategy in response to the defense’s positioning strategy by modeling the interaction as a zero-sum game and solving for an equilibrium pair of strategies. We demonstrate two examples where the game theory model is appropriate: against shift-beating hitters who pull the ball less frequently when the defense shifts against them and against pull-heavy left-handed hitters who threaten to bunt against an extreme shift.

Author(s): William Melville

William Melville received his undergraduate degree in applied and computational mathematics at BYU in 2020 before starting a job as an analyst with the Texas Rangers. He returned to BYU in 2022 where he is currently pursuing a PhD in computer science. His research focuses on applications of game theory to baseball strategy. His passion for baseball runs much deeper than just the analytics; he also has a great appreciation for the equipment of the game and makes wooden bats in his home woodshop.

Samuel Wise

Samuel Wise is an undergraduate at Brigham Young University in his final semester as a Statistics major with an emphasis in Data Science and a minor in Economics. He is from Walnut Creek, California and enjoys exploring his passion for sports through data analytics. He recently has been interested in ranking algorithms and their applications in sports. He is an avid fan of football and the New Orleans Saints, as well as basketball and the UFC. When he is not watching sports, he is watching movies and playing video games with his friends. 

Grant Nielson

Grant Nielson is in his final undergraduate year studying Statistics at BYU. He has enjoyed this past year working on baseball projects with IDeA labs, helping him towards his goals of attending grad school and working with a major league team. Having Dallas roots, his favorite memory is watching his Texas Rangers win the World Series in person last year. He also enjoys biking along the Wasatch Front, watching Moneyball, and playing piano and basketball.

Tristan Mott

Tristan Mott grew up in Austin, TX and later moved to Alpine, UT. He enjoys spending his free time traveling, backpacking, and fly fishing. In his third year at BYU, he is working on undergraduate degrees in computer engineering (major) and computer science (minor). He is passionate about playing and watching sports and loves working on research projects for the Texas Rangers and BYU baseball teams. He aspires to someday receive a PhD in computer science so that he can make contributions to the fields of sports, machine learning, and game theory.

Christopher Archibald

Christopher Archibald is an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at BYU, where he has been since 2019.  His research focuses on Artificial Intelligence and Strategic Reasoning, including Sports Analytics. He received his undergraduate degree in Computer Engineering from BYU in 2006 and a PhD in Computer Science from Stanford University in 2011 under the supervision of Yoav Shoham.  From 2011 to 2013 he was a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Alberta under the supervision of Michael Bowling.  From 2013 to 2019 he was an assistant professor at Mississippi State University. He enjoys teaching, playing games with his kids, and learning about obscure sports. 

David Grimsman

David Grimsman is an Assistant Professor in the Computer Science Department at Brigham Young University. He completed BS in Electrical and Computer Engineering at Brigham Young University in 2006 as a Heritage Scholar, and with a focus on signals and systems. After working for BrainStorm, Inc. for several years as a trainer and IT manager, he returned to Brigham Young University and earned an MS in Computer Science in 2016. He then received his PhD in Electrical and Computer Engineering from UC Santa Barbara in 2021. His research interests include multi-agent systems, game theory, distributed optimization, network science, linear systems theory, and security of cyberphysical systems.

The Strain of Success: A Predictive Model for Injury Risk Mitigation and Team Success in Soccer

Short Abstract: Player injuries in soccer significantly impact team performance, club financial stability and player welfare, with the ‘Big Five’ European soccer leagues experiencing a staggering £513 million in injury-related costs during the 2021/22 season. In this paper, we present a novel forward-looking team selection model, framed as a Markov decision process and optimised with Monte Carlo tree search, that balances team performance with the risk of long-term player unavailability due to injury. We demonstrate that real-world teams could reduce the incidence of player injury by ~13% and wages inefficiently spent on injured players by ~11% using our data-driven team selection model.

Author(s): Gregory Everett

Gregory is a PhD candidate at the University of Southampton, where his research is focused on the use of AI to optimize team performance in soccer. Gregory has published papers previously in this field, focusing on optimizing collective team positioning and predicting player behaviour. He has also gained practical experience through an internship at SentientSports, and has a passion for the development of AI models to enhance the effectiveness of operational processes within soccer clubs.

Dr. Ryan Beal

Ryan is the CEO and Co-Founder of SentientSports, an AI startup dedicated to helping sports brands unlock the full potential of AI. The company specializes in providing personalized content and real-time analytics for innovative fan experiences. Holding a PhD from the University of Southampton, his research focused on AI applications in team sports, a domain in which he has published numerous papers. At SentientSports, Ryan has collaborated with many leading sports brands, including leading clubs in the Premier League and NFL. He has been recognized with a Royal Academy of Engineering 1851 Enterprise Fellowship, and his work has been featured in media outlets such as The Athletic and The Times.

Dr. Tim Matthews

Tim is CTO and co-founder of SentientSports as well as holding a PhD in Computer Vision and Artificial Intelligence from the University of Southampton. His research includes creating SquadGuru, an AI system that surpasses 99% of human players in fantasy sports. At SentientSports, Dr. Matthews leads initiatives in developing AI tools for performance analysis and fan engagement, collaborating with various European football teams, including major English Premier League clubs. His work focuses on merging advanced AI techniques with sports analytics to enhance team performance and decision-making.

Prof. Sarvapali Ramchurn

Sarvapali is a leading expert in Artificial Intelligence at the University of Southampton, with a specific focus on trustworthy and responsible AI. He is a co-founder and the Chairman of SentientSports, and also serves as the CEO of Responsible AI UK, the UK government's flagship AI program. Additionally, Professor Ramchurn directs the UKRI Trustworthy Autonomous Systems Hub and has been recognized as a Turing Fellow. His significant academic contributions are evident in his over 7000 citations, and his work has gained widespread recognition, featuring in prominent media outlets like BBC News, New Scientist, Sky News, BBC Click, and Wired.

Prof. Timothy Norman

Professor Timothy Norman is the Head of Electronics and Computer Science at the University of Southampton and serves as the director of the UKRI Minds CDT. His extensive academic career is marked by a strong focus on broader AI topics, including multi-agent systems and AI planning and scheduling. He has been involved in sports research for the past 6 years with a number of his students.

2024 Poster Presenters

How to predict the performance of nba draft prospects.

Short Abstract: We introduce a new mathematical system for predicting outcomes of NBA draft prospects based on the outcomes of other previously drafted players. This approach, which is completely general and applicable to any sport, forms predictions as relevance-weighted averages of prior outcomes using a precise and theoretically justified assessment of relevance derived from principles of information theory. Crucially, a measure called “fit” indicates in advance the unique reliability of each individual prediction and dynamically focuses each prediction on the combinations of predictive variables and previous players that are most informative for the prediction task. Relevance-based prediction addresses complexities that are beyond the capacity of conventional prediction models, but in a way that is more transparent, more flexible, and more theoretically justified than widely used machine learning algorithms.

Author(s): David Turkington

David Turkington is a Founding Partner of Cambridge Sports Analytics. He is also Senior Managing Director and Head of State Street Associates, State Street Corporation’s Cambridge-based innovation hub. Dave is the author of more than 40 peer-reviewed scholarly articles and co-author of three books: Prediction Revisited, Asset Allocation: From Theory to Practice and Beyond, and A Practitioner’s Guide to Asset Allocation. His scholarly research has garnered numerous awards, including the prestigious Harry M. Markowitz Award for his research in relevance-based prediction. Dave graduated summa cum laude from Tufts University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Mathematics and Quantitative Economics. 

Megan Czasonis

Megan Czasonis is a Founding Partner of Cambridge Sports Analytics. She is also Managing Director and Head of Portfolio Management Research at State Street Associates, State Street’s renowned innovation hub located at Harvard Square. Megan has published extensively in peer-reviewed journals and is a co-recipient of the prestigious Harry M. Markowitz Award for her research in relevance-based prediction. Megan is a coauthor of the acclaimed book, Prediction Revisited, which introduces an alternative mathematical system for forming predictions from data. She holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Economics and Finance from Bentley University.

Mark Kritzman

Mark Kritzman is a Founding Partner of Cambridge Sports Analytics. He is also a Founding Partner of Windham Capital Management and State Street Associates, and he teaches a graduate finance course at MIT Sloan. He has served on several boards including the Government Investment Corporation of Singapore, the Institute for Quantitative Research in Finance, the International Securities Exchange, The Investment Fund for Foundations, the MIT Sloan Finance Group, Protego Trust Corporation, and St. John’s University. He has published more than 100 articles in peer-reviewed journals and is the author or co-author of eight books including Prediction Revisited, Asset Allocation: From Theory to Practice and Beyond, The Portable Financial Analyst, and Puzzles of Finance. Mark has won numerous awards for his scholarly research including the Harry M. Markowitz Award for his research in relevance-based prediction. In 2004, Mark was elected a Batten Fellow at the Darden Graduate School of Business Administration, University of Virginia. Mark holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Economics from St. John’s University and a Master of Business Administration degree with distinction from New York University.

Cel Kulasekaran

Cel Kulasekaran is a Founding Partner of Cambridge Sports Analytics. He is also Managing Partner at Windham Capital Management, where he leads applied research for Windham’s asset management business and its strategic partnerships. ​Cel is the founding architect of Windham’s innovation arm, Windham Labs, which delivers portfolio optimization and risk management technology to investors worldwide. His research has appeared in peer-reviewed academic journals. Cel holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Mathematical Sciences with distinction from Worcester Polytechnic Institute and a Master of Arts degree in Mathematical Finance from Boston University. 

Noisy Judgments: A probability surface-based analysis of umpiring variability

Author(s): Emily-Anne Patt

Emily-Anne Patt is the manager for quantitative intelligence and methodologies supporting security and resilience at Alphabet, Inc. based in Washington, D.C. Her background is in econometrics and financial economics, with prior experience in several US government agencies. Fenway Park will always be home, but these days you can find her at Nationals Park or coaching the scholar athletes at the Washington Nationals Youth Baseball Academy. 

James Stockton

James Stockton, PhD. is the lead data scientist at Altamira Technologies supporting the United States Air Force Chief Data and AI Office based in northern Virginia. His background is in astronomy and astrophysics and he has worked as a data scientist in private industry, academia, and supported federal customers in the DoD/IC space for over a decade. He's an avid climber and mountaineer and will happily talk about mechanical advantage haul systems longer than any sane person should.

Player Pressure Map - A Novel Representation of Pressure in Soccer for Evaluating Player Performance in Different Game Contexts

Short Abstract: In Noisy Judgments: A probability surface-based analysis of umpiring variability, we establish the size, shape, and position of the strike zone as called during an MLB game by building a prior probability surface from 5.3 million called balls and strikes between the 2008 and 2022 seasons. We used this surface to evaluate changes in the actual strike zone over time, stress-testing the reliability of the model with established baseball facts related to batter and pitcher handedness and seasonal shifts. A sensitivity study shows the validity of the surface at lower pitch counts, allowing us to evaluate individual player and umpire performance across games and within a game. This analysis leads us to propose a novel methodology for evaluating a catcher's framing ability--the Framing Induced Strike Zone (FISZ).

Author(s): Chaoyi Gu

Aaron (Chaoyi Gu) received the MS degree (First class) in sports analytics and technologies from the Institute for Sport Business, Loughborough University, London, United Kingdom in 2020. Chaoyi is currently a Ph.D. from the Institute for Digital Technologies, Loughborough University, London. His research interests include machine learning, multi-agent systems, and sports analytics.

Jiaming (Jamie) Na is a PhD student at Loughborough University's Institute for Digital Technologies. With a background in statistics and a long-time passion for sports, his research centers on advancing sports analytics through computer vision AI models. His work aims to revolutionize performance analysis and strategic decision-making in athletics.

Yisheng Pei

Yisheng Pei is a third-year PhD student at Loughborough University London and a loyal Arsenal fan. His research interest lies in machine learning and deep learning applications in sports analytics, particularly soccer. He is always looking forward to understanding and quantifying players’ efforts on the pitch.n should.

Varuna De Silva

Varuna De Silva is a Reader (Associate Professor) in Machine Intelligence at Loughborough University. He directs the machine intelligence lab at Loughborough University London, where his team works on multi agent reinforcement learning, multimodal machine learning and their applications in Sports Analytics and Autonomous Systems.

A model-based risk-impact analysis of dribble actions in women's soccer

Short Abstract: Our paper presents a model-based approach to quantify individual dribbles in women's soccer based on value and risk attributes. By analyzing over 48,000 dribbles in the 2023 Women's World Cup using machine learning techniques, we measure the expected probability of success and the expected threat of each dribble. The results highlight players who outperform expectations, but can also be used to analyze the playing philosophy of different teams. The findings have implications for player recruitment and development as well as team tactics in women's football. The source code can be found on https://github.com/stefanthiem/xT_Dribbles_Pressure .

Author(s): Tobias Beckman

After completing his master's degree in mathematics, Tobias joined the European consultancy d-fine in 2019. Having played soccer enthusiastically from an early age, he quickly joined the company's sports analytics team. There, he now uses his knowledge to quantify the youth development work of soccer clubs, develop methods for match analysis and develop customized scouting platforms using modern open-source tools.

Gerhard Waldhart

Gerhard is a sports scientist and soccer analyst, currently serving as the Head of Match Analysis for VfL Wolfsburg Women, champion of the German Bundesliga in 2022 and UWCL Women’s Champions League Finalist 2023. Gerhard has been a licensed coach for 17 years and is currently pursuing a master's degree in match analysis at the University of Cologne – always looking for an added edge through data and analytics.

Stefan Thiem

Stefan is a Senior Consultant at the European consultancy d-fine, where he works as a data scientist. In his projects, he supports sports clubs gaining insights from data for match analysis and talent evaluation. He graduated from the University of Münster with a PhD in sports economics and with a bachelor’s degree in mathematics. In addition, he has been holding a soccer coaching license from the UEFA for seven years. Stefan is very passionate about sports in general and he maintains his own sports podcast, where he covers and discusses interesting scientific questions related to sports.

Oliver Wohak

Oliver is a Senior Manager at the European consultancy d-fine, where he supports his clients in tackling the most complex challenges in digital transformation. Driven by his passion for sports and complemented by his master’s degrees in physics and Business Administration, Oliver built up the Sports Analytics team within d-fine and has been supporting clubs and associations in developing internal data analytics and IT solutions for over 5 years. While his main focus is on scouting, match analysis and talent development in soccer, his experience also includes ice hockey, basketball and handball. Stemming from his time in the US, Oliver is an avid American Football fan, roots for the Eagles and especially enjoys Fantasy Football season.

Using Tracking Data to Build Offensive Line Development Tools

Short Abstract: American football has in recent years made drastic shifts towards the quantitative. The proliferation of charting and tracking data has given us the ability to better evaluate and value players, but player development has been left wanting. In this paper we use NFL's Next Gen Stats data to build tools for offensive linemen in pass protection, which will help teams more efficiently watch film, monitor performance and fitness, build rosters, and game plan, with player development as the central focus. 

Author(s): Eric Eager

Eric Eager is the VP of Research and Development at SumerSports. He holds a doctorate in mathematical biology from the University of Nebraska - Lincoln, and has published over 30 papers, including three at the MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference. He is the co-author of the book: Football Analytics with Python and R: Learning Data Science Through the Lens of Sports. 

Tej Seth is a data scientist at SumerSports with a focus on football analytics. He graduated from the University of Michigan, where he worked with the football team. He is an avid Lions fan and outside of football loves listening to podcasts and going to the gym.

  Ben Brown  

Ben Brown is a data scientist at SumerSports. Prior to joining Sumer, he was the Head of Betting Innovation at PFF, where he won numerous DFS tournaments at both the NFL and NCAA level and hosted the PFF Daily Betting Podcast and various live streams.

Haley English

Haley English is currently a Football Information Intern with the Detroit Lions. She recently graduated from Villanova University and previously interned at Pro Football Focus. Outside of football analytics, she enjoys taking trips to the lake and watching her former sport, gymnastics.

Geoff Schwartz

From his pre-Bar Mitzvah stuttering days to being drafted 241st (out of 252) in the 2008 NFL draft, Geoff Schwartz has overcome adversity to exceed all expectations and impressively succeed in life. His eight-year career included stints with the Carolina Panthers, Minnesota Vikings, Kansas City Chiefs and New York Giants, where he signed a 4-year deal to become a starting guard on the Eli Manning-led team. Unfortunately, injuries derailed Geoff’s career and caused his retirement from the NFL in February 2017. Before his retirement Geoff began a seamless transition to a career in media. He can be heard daily on Sirius XM Radio 373 hosting PAC-12 Today and on the weekend hosting Fox Sports Radio. Geoff is a Fox Sports NFL gambling analyst, providing digital and written content. He hosts his own podcast, Geoff Schwartz Is Smarter Than You, where Geoff makes the average football fan smarter. He appears routinely on sports radio talk shows and podcasts throughout the country offering his insights on football, other sports plus a wide variety of non-sports related topics.

How Much Do Faceoffs Matter? Translating Faceoffs to Goals, Wins, and Championships in Hockey

Short Abstract: In hockey, faceoffs have long been acknowledged as important drivers of puck possession, but their actual impact on scoring outcomes remains inadequately measured. It is acceptedly evident that a center winning 54% of their faceoffs outperforms one with a 51% success rate, but the tangible extent of this advantage in terms of goals, wins, and losses remains underexplored. This research fills the void by continuing the effort to translate faceoff results to scoring outcomes, measuring faceoff performance in goals, wins, and losses in a novel manner. We explore evidence that faceoffs are an undervalued championship-caliber market inefficiency and offer models enabling General Managers to see role-specific projections of how different personnel and usage could maximize offense, defense, and championship chances.

Author(s): Tad Berkery

Tad is a senior at Johns Hopkins University majoring in Computer Science and Economics and minoring in Computational Medicine and Applied Mathematics & Statistics. He has completed research or worked directly for teams spanning the Big Ten, MLB, NHL, and NFL. Tad has also been featured in The Washington Post and is the author of What’s the “Right” Career? . In his free time, you can find him hanging out with family and friends, playing games, or trying his hand at becoming an at-home barista.

Chase Seibold

Chase is a recent graduate of Syracuse University, holding Bachelor's degrees in Economics and Sport Analytics, along with a Master's degree in Applied Data Science. During his time at Syracuse, he interned with Wasserman in the baseball department and contributed to the Washington Nationals R&D group as an intern. He is currently an R&D Analyst for the Nationals.

Max Stevens

My name is Max Stevens, and I am currently a student at Johns Hopkins University, set to graduate in May 2024 with degrees in Applied Mathematics & Statistics and Economics. Professionally, I have gained valuable experience as a Data Analyst intern at Attain Sports, a sports holding company with interests in baseball and soccer. My role involved predictive modeling for game scenarios and applying my analytical skills to enhance the business aspects of their sports portfolio. Previously, I was a member of the Johns Hopkins football team. I am a dedicated fan of Boston sports having grown up in Lexington, Massachusetts. Most recently, I have discovered a passion for European football and have pledged myself to the Tottenham Hotspur football club, COYS.

Justin is a recent graduate from Johns Hopkins who was a part of the Johns Hopkins University Sports Analytics Research Group for three years. During his time working under Dr. Anton Dahbura, he worked on projects in baseball, football, and hockey, including projects for the Baltimore Orioles and Ravens. Since graduating in May with degrees in Computer Science and Applied Mathematics & Statistics, he has been working on the AWS Cloudfront Team as a Software Developer Engineer.

Anton Dahbura

Anton (Tony) Dahbura received the BSEE, MSEE, and PhD in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from the Johns Hopkins University in 1981, 1982, and 1984, respectively. He served as a researcher at AT&T Bell Laboratories, was an Invited Lecturer in the Department of Computer Science at Princeton University, and served as Research Director of the Motorola Cambridge Research Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In January, 2012 he was named Executive Director of the Johns Hopkins University Information Security Institute in Baltimore and joined the faculty of the Johns Hopkins University Department of Computer Science as an Associate Research Scientist. In September 2018 he was named Co-Director of the Johns Hopkins University Institute for Assured Autonomy. Tony has had a love for baseball since childhood. He was named to the National Under-18 Baseball Team of El Salvador, where he lived for most of his early years, and was an outfielder for Johns Hopkins as an undergraduate. In 2010 he became co-owner of the Hagerstown Suns, the low-A affiliate of the Washington Nationals.

Analyzing NBA Player Positions and Interactions with Density-Functional Fluctuation Theory

Short Abstract: Player tracking data can enhance the quantification of player abilities and our understanding of team composition and broader team strategies. In this work, we demonstrate how density-functional fluctuation theory (DFFT), an extension of a Nobel Prize-winning physics approach, can process basketball tracking data by treating players as interacting densities. By training the interactions on different play outcomes, we can evaluate play-outcome likelihoods based on player positions, determine which players are in strong or weak positions, and understand which players consistently instigate strong responses from the opposing team (i.e., ‘player gravity’). We find that our approach not only identifies the overall strengths of a player, but also identifies subtleties such as those who are left-handed (e.g., D. Russell) or who instigate changes non-locally through frequent passes (e.g., N. Jokic). 

Author(s): Boris Barron

Boris Barron is a PhD candidate in Theoretical Physics at Cornell University, where he is affiliated with the Cornell Population Center. He holds a Master of Science in Mathematical and Theoretical Physics from the University of Oxford and a Bachelor of Science in Biophysics from York University. His research experience has spanned microfluidics, laser stability physics, machine learning, and increasingly complex systems in the broadest sense. Recently, he has been developing a novel framework for understanding residential segregation, with work that has included presentations at the U.S. Census Bureau, American Sociological Association (ASA), American Physical Society (APS), and the Population Association of America (PAA). His work has been funded in part by NSERC PGS-D. Beyond academia, Boris used to be a competitive ballroom dancer and is a speed typist, averaging over 120 words per minute –  height limitations have prevented him from being a serious contender in basketball.

Nathan S. Sitaraman

Nathan Sitaraman is a postdoctoral associate in the Cornell Laboratory for Accelerator-based ScienceS and Education (CLASSE) and a part-time consultant for the Dallas Mavericks. He graduated from Yale University cum laude with a bachelor's degree in physics, and completed his PhD in physics at Cornell. His research focuses on improving teamwork among superconducting electrons, as well as the much more complicated problem of improving teamwork among basketball players.

Tomas A. Arias

Tomás Arias, a Professor of Physics at Cornell University, holds SB and PhD degrees in Physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he also briefly served on the faculty in the late 1990s before joining Cornell. He is an expert in developing novel density-functional theory (DFT) methods, with thirty years of experience and more than 60 publications on this topic alone, contributing to a total of 91 publications with over 25,000 citations. His recent work involves the development of joint density-functional theory (JDFT), a specialized method for analyzing the equilibrium of liquids and solids, and density functional fluctuation theory (DFFT), which extends the theory to understand the collective behaviors of human crowds and animal groups, as well as human residential segregation and group sports.

Previous Research Paper Finalists

Full paper submission form, full paper submissions for ssac24 are due friday, december 1, 2023 at 11:59pm et., open source competition - voting.

Review our SSAC 2022 open source finalists below and cast your vote for your favorite submission HERE !

2022 Open Source Finalists

Alejandro Rodriguez Pascal, Ishan Mehta, Muhammad Khan, Rose Yu, Frank Rodriz

Matthew Wear, Ryan Beal, Tim Matthews, Gopal Ramchurn, Tim Norman

DeMars DeRover

Connor Heaton, Prasenjit Mitra

Subscribe for the latest news and updates

Bringing together the leading figures in sports analytics, business, and technology.

Student Paper Competition

The 2024 Student Competitions are now open!  Learn more here...

CARSP, and more specifically the CARSP Young Professionals' Committee , hosts an annual competition for a scientific paper, written by a student registered at a Canadian university, on any aspect of motor vehicle traffic safety. For several years, and ending in 2017, the competition was sponsored by the Insurance Bureau of Canada (IBC). CARSP is very grateful for IBC's support. Unfortunately, there was no competition in 2018 due to lack of a sponsor. Western Ergonomics graciously sponsored both the 2019 and the 2021 Student Paper Competition and helped us to continue this legacy (the 2020 CARSP Conference was cancelled due to COVID-19).

If you are interested in sponsoring this competition, please contact [email protected] for more information.

Winning Student Papers

Ite canada/carsp joint conference - 2023 winnipeg.

Taweel, Hildebrand Student Paper Competition: 1st Place | Dr. Charles H. Miller Award

Morrison Student Paper Competition: 2nd Place

Li, Xu, Guo, Yang Student Paper Competition: 3rd Place

CARSP Hybrid Conference - 2022 Sudbury

Hildebrand, Stewart Student Paper Competition: 1st Place

Shangguan, Fu, Wang, Fang, Fu Student Paper Competition: 2nd Place

HubkaRao, Mishra, Churchill, Cloutier, Nettel-Aguirre, Hagel Student Paper Competition: 3rd Place

CARSP/PRI 2021 Joint Virtual Conference - 2021

Hasanpour, Persaud Student Paper Competition: 1st Place

Wu Student Paper Competition: 2nd Place

Delavary, de Montigny, Tremblay, Castellucci, Lavallière Student Paper Competition: 3rd Place

CARSP Conference - 2019 Calgary

Carrillo, Crowley Student Paper Competition: 1st Place

Jafari Anarkooli, Milligan, Penner, Persaud, Saleem Student Paper Competition: 2nd Place | Dr. Charles H. Miller Award

Valentine Student Paper Competition: 3rd Place

Fridman, Ling, Rothman, Cloutier, Hagel, Howard Student Paper Competition: Honourable Mention

CARSP Conference - 2018 Victoria

Posts not found

CARSP Conference - 2017 Toronto

Maria Espinosa Student Paper Competition: 1st Place

Caitlin Sowers, Eric Hildebrand Student Paper Competition: 2nd Place

Ting Fu, Luis F. Miranda-Moreno, Nicolas Saunier Student Paper Competition: 3rd Place

Gabriel Suskin, Neville Suskin Student Paper Competition: Honourable Mention

CARSP Conference - 2016 Halifax

Lalita Thakali, Liping Fu, Tao Chen Student Paper Competition: 1st Place

Taha Saleem, Robert Henderson, Bhagwant Persaud Student Paper Competition: 2nd Place

Ting Fu, Joshua Stipancic, Sohail Zangenehpour, Luis F. Miranda-Moreno, Nicolas Saunier Student Paper Competition: 3rd Place

James Roos Student Paper Competition: Honourable Mention

Maryam Merrikhpour, Birsen Donmez Student Paper Competition: Honourable Mention

CARSP Conference - 2015 Ottawa

Sohail Zangenehpour, Jillian Strauss, Luis F. Miranda-Moreno, Nicolas Saunier Student Paper Competition: 1st Place

Jillian Strauss, Ph.D. (Candidate), Luis F. Miranda-Moreno, Ph.D., Patrick Morency Student Paper Competition: 2nd Place

Emmanuel Takyi, Peter Park Student Paper Competition: 3rd Place

CMRSC XXIV - 2014 Vancouver

Jillian Strauss, Luis F. Miranda-Moreno, Patrick Morency Student Paper Competition: 1st Place

Sohail Zangenehpour, Luis F. Miranda-Moreno, Nicolas Saunier Student Paper Competition: 2nd Place

Bidoura Khondaker, Lina Kattan Student Paper Competition: 3rd Place

CMRSC XXIII - 2013 Montreal

• Development of Crash Modification Factors for Left Side Rumble Strips Matthew P. Mulkern, Eric D. Hildebrand Award winner: Étudiant 1 Student
• Bayesian Modeling Approach for Cyclist Injury Risk: Comparison of Signalized and Non-Signalized Intersections Jillian Strauss, Luis F. Miranda-Moreno, Patrick Morency Award winner: Étudiant 2 Student
• (Français) Entraînement sur simulateur chez une personne ayant subi un traumatisme crânien sévère et transfert des apprentissages sur la route Martin Lavallière Award winner: Étudiant 3 Student

CMRSC XXII - 2012 Banff

• Effect of Intersection Designs on Cyclist Injury Risk Jillian Strauss, Luis F. Miranda-Moreno Award winner: Étudiant 1 Student
• Applicability of Shared Spaces Concepts to Canadian Communities Jeremy Adamson Award winner: Étudiant 2 Student
• Evaluation of Diagnosis Tools for Safety Improvement Projects Rajib K. Sahaji, Peter Y. Park, George Eguakun, Angela Gardiner Award winner: Étudiant 3 Student

CMRSC XXI - 2011 Halifax

• Analysis of Driver Behaviour and Collision Risks for Protected Freeway Entrance and Exit Ramps: Trajectories and Surrogate Safety Measures Paul St-Aubin, Luis Miranda-Moreno, Nicolas Saunier Award winner: Étudiant 1 Student
• Evaluation of Peripheral and Transverse Pavement Markings for Speed Reduction Javier Zamora, Eric Hildebrand, Peter Allaby, Jonathan Lewis, Darren Charters Award winner: Étudiant 2 Student
• The Effects of Music Tempo on Driver Risk Taking Ashley Hall, David L. Wiesenthal Award winner: Étudiant 3 Student

CMRSC XX - 2010 Niagara

• Automated safety analysis video sensors: technology and case studies Karim Ismail Award winner: Étudiant 1 Student
• "Drivers' Reactions to Motorcyclists on the Roadway " has no version set!
• A Pilot Study on Child Pedestrian and Cyclist Motor Vehicle Collisions Vu (Brian) Le Award winner: Étudiant 3 Student

CMRSC XIX - 2009 Saskatoon

• Attributional Theory: A new source for driver safety initiatives Christine M. Wickens Award winner: Étudiant 1 Student
• Spatial-temporal transferability of macro-level collision prediction models Bidoura Khondaker Award winner: Étudiant 2 Student
• Road design or near-road features which increase the probability of wildlife collisions: the analysis of observations made during the 2009 Saskatchewan black spot screening project Elena Zabolotny Award winner: Étudiant 3 Student

CMRSC XVIII - 2008 Whistler

• Is a hands-free phone safer than a handheld phone? Yoko Ishigami, Raymond M. Klein Award winner: Étudiant 1 Student
• Use of Driver Manuals to Communicate the Risk of Wildlife Hazards to New Drivers in Western Canada Leonard E. Sielecki Award winner: Étudiant 2 Student
• Unintentional Cycling Injuries in Manitoba: Primary Prevention Michelle Nostedt Award winner: Étudiant 3 Student

CMRSC XVII - 2007 Montreal

• Wheelchair accessibility: Descriptive study of intersections in an urban area Sean Bennett, R. Lee Kirby, Blair MacDonald Award winner: Étudiant 1 Student

AGM - 2000 Blainville

• "Lower Universal Anchorages and Occupant Safety In Rear Impacts " has no version set!
• "Accident Prediction Models With and Without Trend: Application of the Generalised Estimating Equations (GEE) Procedure " has no version set!

CMRSC XI - 1999 Halifax

• Child Pedestrian Injuries on One-Way versus Two-Way Streets Wazana A, Torrance VL, Raina P, Krueger P, Chambers LW Award winner: Étudiant 1 Student

CMRSC X - 1997 Toronto

• Human Factors in Motor Vehicle Collision Investigations Award winner: Étudiant 1 Student

Username or Email Address

Remember Me

Lost your password?

Canadian Chemistry Contest

Is chemistry one of your strengths? Test your skills and measure yourself against fellow students who share the same passion!

What is the CCC?

The Canadian Chemistry Contest (CCC) is carried out in conjunction with the Canadian Chemistry Olympiad (CCO). The CCC fosters an appreciation of chemistry as a career for talented young people and promotes national excellence in chemistry at the high school/Cégep level. Over 600 students write this exam annually, in conjunction with the CCO exam. The CCC is aimed at the top 10% of Canadian high school and cégep students under 20 years of age taking chemistry. The CCO is aimed at the top 5% of these students.

The Canadian Chemistry Olympiad (CCO) would love to have volunteer graduate chemistry students help senior high school chemistry students work through Olympiad level Chemistry problems as guest lecturers at the Canadian Olympiad training camps in May, June, and July 2024.   The preparatory problems from the International Chemistry Olympiad 2020  provide good exemplars of the types of problems the CCO would like graduate students to present and explain to students. We would love to hear from interested students in every area of chemistry. If you’re interested, please reach out .

When and where do the CCC and CCO exams take place?

The CCC contest Part A and B and C will take place Tuesday, April 23rd, 2024.

The place: at school or online.

Deadline to sign up for the contest is 12 noon (EDT) on Monday, April 1st, 2024.

How to Participate

Read the Letter from the National Examiner for further information and FAQs.

Find the regional or district coordinator nearest you.

For more information email to:

Guillaume Bussiere Canadian Chemistry Contest National Coordinator [email protected]

Past Winners

Winners from 2014 to present .

Preparation Materials and Past Exams

Data Sheet for CCC/CCO contests Provisional Curriculum Analysis of Part B of past contests

2022 contest Part A Quick Solutions to Part A Part B Marking of Part B Part C  Solutions to Part C

2021 contest Part A Quick Solutions to Part A Part B Marking of Part B Part C

2020 contest Part A Quick Solutions to Part A Part B Marking of Part B Part C

2019 contest Part A Quick Solutions to Part A Part B Marking of Part B Part C

2018 contest Part A Quick Solutions to Part A Part B Marking of Part B Part C

2017 contest Part A Quick Solutions to Part A Part B Marking of Part B Part C

2016 contest Part A Quick Solutions to Part A Part B Marking of Part B Part C

2015 contest Part A Quick Solutions to Part A Part B Marking of Part B Part C

2014 contest Part A Quick Solutions to Part A Part B Marking of Part B Part C

Concours canadien de chimie

Est-ce que la chimie est votre matière forte? Alors venez mettre vos aptitudes à l’épreuve et vous mesurer à vos collègues de partout au pays qui partagent la même passion!  

Le Concours canadien de chimie (CCC) se tient conjointement avec l’Olympiade canadienne de chimie (OCC). Le CCC est un concours national qui promeut l’excellence en chimie au secondaire et au CEGEP. Le concours s’adresse surtout aux étudiants talentueux qui considèrent une carrière en chimie. A chaque année plus de 600 étudiants participent au CCC et à l’OCC. Le CCC s’adresse aux étudiants de haut calibre, les meilleurs dix pour cent, de niveau secondaire ou CEGEP âgés de moins de 20 ans.  L’OCC vise la tranche supérieure, soit environ 5% de ces étudiants.

Quand se tient-il?

Le Concours Canadien de Chimie (CCC) Partie A, B et C aura lieu le mardi 23 avril 2024.

L’endroit: à l’école ou en ligne.

La date limite pour s’enregistrer est le lundi premier avril à midi (12:00) heure de l’est.

Comment participer

Lisez la Lettre de l’Examinatrice nationale pour de l’information générale et des réponses à vos questions (FAQ).

Pour plus d’information, contactez votre coordinateurs régionaux ou du district de concours.

Pour plus d’information vous pouvez envoyer un courriel a:

Guillaume Bussiere Coordinateur national du Concours canadien de chimie [email protected]

Gagnants 2014 au présent (EN)

Matérial de préparation et examens des années antéruieurs

Fiche de donnés pour le CCC et l’OCC Programme provisoire Analyse de la Partie B des examens récents (EN)

Concours 2022 Partie A Réponses courtes aux questions de la Partie A Partie B Évaluation de la Partie B Partie C

Concours 2021 Partie A Réponses courtes aux questions de la Partie A Partie B Évaluation de la Partie B

Concours 2020 Partie A Réponses courtes aux questions de la Partie A Partie B Évaluation de la Partie B

Concours 2019 Partie A Réponses courtes aux questions de la Partie A Partie B Évaluation de la Partie B Partie C

Concours 2018 Partie A Réponses courtes aux questions de la Partie A Partie B Évaluation de la Partie B Partie C

Concours 2017 Partie A Réponses courtes aux questions de la Partie A Partie B Évaluation de la Partie B Partie C

Concours 2016 Partie A Réponses courtes aux questions de la Partie A Partie B Évaluation de la Partie B Partie C

Concours 2015 Partie A Réponses courtes aux questions de la Partie A Partie B Évaluation de la Partie B Partie C

Concours 2014 Partie A Réponses courtes aux questions de la Partie A Partie B Évaluation de la Partie B Partie C

Language selection

• Français fr

National Research Council Canada

Featured link.

Charting our path forward – 2023-24 plans at a glance

Featured links

Privacy breach affecting current and former federal employees

If you have used BGRS or SIRVA Canada relocation services, your personal information may have been compromised. Learn about what precautionary measures are available to you.

Services and information

Support for technology innovation.

Get funding and advice from the Industrial Research Assistance Program (NRC IRAP)

Research and development

Learn about our broad expertise, research and testing facilities, collaborations, technical services and intellectual property

Certifications, evaluations and standards

Codes, materials testing, lab certifications, reference materials, official time and more

Areas of research

Find a specialized research centre to help accelerate scientific breakthroughs and innovation

[Select a Research centre]

• Aerospace Research Centre
• Aquatic and Crop Resource Development Research Centre
• Automotive and Surface Transportation Research Centre
• Clean Energy Innovation Research Centre
• Construction Research Centre
• Digital Technologies Research Centre
• Herzberg Astronomy and Astrophysics Research Centre
• Human Health Therapeutics Research Centre
• Medical Devices Research Centre
• Metrology Research Centre
• Ocean, Coastal and River Engineering Research Centre
• Quantum and Nanotechnologies Research Centre

Challenge programs

Industry partnerships to advance high-risk, high-reward research that address Canadian priorities

[Select a Challenge program]

• Aging in Place
• Applied Quantum Computing
• Arctic and Northern
• Artificial Intelligence for Design
• Construction Sector Digitalization and Productivity
• Critical Battery Materials Initiative
• Disruptive Technology Solutions for Cell and Gene Therapy
• High-throughput and Secure Networks
• Internet of Things: Quantum Sensors
• Low Carbon Built Environment
• Materials for Clean Fuels
• Pandemic Response

Open calls for proposals and expressions of interest

Find the complete list of calls for proposals and expressions of interest currently available

Success stories

Updates in your community

• Ottawa: Combustion testing, week of April 22, 2024 (1 day of testing)
• Ottawa: Combustion testing, week of April 29, 2024 (2 days of testing)
• Ottawa: Gas turbine engine testing from February 4 to August 5, 2024

Research publications

• Annealed fractional Lévy–Itō diffusion models for protein generation
• Longitudinal study of paralytic shellfish toxins along Canada's coast
• Active‐learning for global optimization of Ni‐Ceria nanoparticles: the case of Ce₄₋ₓNiₓO₈₋ₓ (x = 1, 2, 3)
• Toward a national database on flooding events caused by river ice

All research publications

Patents and IP licensing

• Sensor for Level Detection
• Method of Volumetric Additive Manufacturing Via 3d Ray-Tracing Dose Optimization
• Method of Volumetric Additive Manufacturing

All licensing opportunities

• Contact the NRC

About the National Research Council Canada

• Accessibility
• Organizational structure
• Planning and reporting
• Research excellence
• Transparency
• Values and ethics
• More: About the NRC

Follow the NRC

• The NRC's LinkedIn account
• The NRC's X account
• The NRC's Instagram account
• The NRC's YouTube video gallery

The Honourable François‑Philippe Champagne Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry

Mitch Davies President of the National Research Council of Canada

Latest news

• Government of Canada supporting Acentury Inc. in developing semiconductor technologies for wireless communications [2024-03-15 - 16:00]
• National Research Council of Canada announces funding for Canada–UK quantum collaborations [2024-02-14 - 09:00]

Climate change and sustainability research at the NRC

Learn how the NRC is fighting climate change and addressing major Canadian and international environmental challenges

Indigenous collaborations

Learn about the work underway within the NRC and with Indigenous collaborators

• Seminar Series
• Competition
• Conferences
• Meet the CAPB Executive Committee
• The Pioneering & Distinguished Canadian Plant Biotechnologist Award

CAPB Newsletter

Latest news.

February 2024 Our new weekly Student Webinar Series showcasing graduate student research will take place on Thursdays at 3:00pm EST beginning on March 7th. Check out our Seminar Series page for more information and to see our amazing lineup of speakers.

February 2024 Plant Canada 2024 will be taking place July 6-10, 2024 in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Visit the conference website for more information on the program, registration, and abstract submission.

January 2024 A new CAPB Newsletter has just been released. Head over to the Archives page for CAPB updates and to see what the association has been involved in the past few years.

January 2024 The upcoming Student Webinar series hosted by the Canadian Association of Plant Biotechnology (CAPB) has been rescheduled for this Spring. This series will provide an official platform for graduate students to showcase their research on plant biotechnology and related fields. These seminars will take place March through April, and CAPB Excellence prizes will be awarded to the best presentations. If you are interested in presenting, please fill out this form by February 9th, 2024.

For any questions, please contact Justin Boissinot at [email protected]

January 2024 We are very excited to announce that the 2024 CAPB Research Paper Competition is now active and runs until March 31, 2024. This is an opportunity for CAPB members who are undergraduate students, graduate students, or recent graduates to win one of two prizes for writing an outstanding research paper. Check out the Competition page for details and the submission form.

September 2023 The Laboratory of Marco Todesco in the Michael Smith Laboratories at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver is looking for a Research Assistant/Technician 4. More information can be found here .

August 2023 The CAPB will be holding a Student Webinar Series in the Fall semester, starting in September or October and ending in December. This series will provide an official platform for student and postdoc members to showcase their research in plant biotechnology and related fields. Student webinars will take place every week or so, around noon EST to facilitate everyone’s participation all across the country. The total number of sessions will depend on the number of proposed contributions. At the end of the competition, the best presenters will be given CAPB Excellence awards.

April 2023 The third seminar in our CAPB Seminar Series takes place Thursday, April 6th at 10 AM EST with Dr. Leena Tripathi. For more information, visit our  Seminar Series page.

March 2023 Our CAPB Seminar Series continues this month with Dr. Hadrien Peyret presenting his research on Thursday, March 2nd at noon EST. For more information, visit our  Seminar Series page.

January 2023 We are pleased to announce the CAPB Seminar Series will resume this month. Ed Rybicki will kick off the series on Thursday, January 26th at noon EST. For more information, visit our  Seminar Series page.

January 2023 Opportunity for post-secondary students to attend the 2023 Canadian Crops Convention taking place in Ottawa from March 7-9th, 2023. Student scholarships are available to cover registration fees, travel expenses, and accommodations. To apply, send your resume to [email protected] by January 31st, 2023 with a brief explanation of your motivation for attending the convention. Any questions can be directed to Sandra Esposito at [email protected] or 613-277-0109.

May 2022 CAPB2022 (13th Canadian Plant Biotechnology Conference) taking place in Quebec City this August! Visit the conference website for details.

Check out the latest CAPB newsletter >>>

•  Promote interaction among plant biotechnology researchers in Canada •  Liaison with the International Association of Plant Biotechnology •  Advocate for plant biotechnology research •  Bridge the gap between academia/basic research and industry •  Serve as a contact point for plant biotechnology-related information in Canada

Our History

In 2015, IAPB Canada was renamed to Canadian Association for Plant Biotechnology (CAPB).

IAPB Canada was part of the International Association for Plant Biotechnology (IAPB). IAPB was formed in 1970-1971 with the name of the International Association for Plant Tissue Culture (IAPTC) when plant in vitro regeneration was a major research area in plant sciences.

In 1998, IAPTC congress was held in Israel and the association was renamed to include Biotechnology (IAPTC&B) according to the research area expansion. During the 11 th IAPTC&B Congress which was held in Beijing, China in 2006, the association name was once again changed to its current name: The International Association for Plant Biotechnology (IAPB). This name reflects the research change and development from the original plant tissue culture.

What are your chances of acceptance?

Calculate for all schools, your chance of acceptance.

Your chancing factors

Extracurriculars.

20 Science Research Competitions for High Schoolers

What’s covered:, why should you enter a science research competition, how do science research competitions affect my admissions chances.

Participation in science research competitions offers many benefits to students; for example, it can make them more competitive candidates for college admissions and provide them with valuable experience in a sought-after field. There’s a wide variety of science research competitions for high schoolers, including the high-profile contests listed below.

Entering a science research competition demonstrates that you take initiative and that you care about academics beyond the grades in your courses, both of which are qualities that colleges appreciate in prospective students.

Participation in competitions is a strong extracurricular activity, and successes—like making the finals or winning—can provide you with a chance to earn a scholarship, make your college application more attention-grabbing, or even open doors, such as laying the groundwork for a career in science research and helping you land an internship.

Another way to showcase your initiative and skills is to work on an independent research paper. There are a number of ways to do independent research, including working with a high school teacher, reaching out to local professors, or taking part in a structured research program. 

For example, the  Lumiere Research Scholar Program is one type of structured research program tailored for high school students. In the program, you work 1-1 with a researcher on an independent research project. The program is run by researchers from Harvard and helps create the structure for you to get started quickly doing your own research. Many of Lumiere’s alums have used their research in the structured program to then apply to research competitions like ISEF.  

Whether you participate in a structured program first or dive right into a competition, engaging in research allows you to explore one of your interests deeply, while simultaneously boosting your profile for college admissions.

1. American Academy of Neurology – Neuroscience Research Prize

Grades: 9-12

Type: National

The AAN Neuroscience Research Prize competition challenges students to investigate problems regarding the brain or nervous system. The competition is only open to individual students—group projects are ineligible. Teachers are encouraged to provide guidance and support; however, they should allow students to demonstrate their own creativity. Winners and their projects are highlighted at the AAN Annual Meeting.

2. Envirothon

Type: State and National

Envirothon is North America’s largest environmental education competition, with more than 25,000 students participating in the multi-level competition each year. Student teams are first challenged at state-level competitions with the winners moving on to face top teams from across the globe at the annual international competition.

The international competition is a six-day event held in a different location each summer—for example, in an open range of the western U.S. one year, and at a Maritime coastal community of eastern Canada the next. The competition offers participants the chance to win thousands of dollars in scholarships.

3. Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF)

Type: Local, Regional, and International

The Regeneron ISEF is the world’s largest international pre-college science competition—more than 1,800 high school students, representing more than 75 countries, regions, and territories, take part. Students showcase independent research and compete for roughly $8 million in awards across 21 categories .

This is not a group-based competition—individual students enroll in local school science fairs before advancing to upper-level competitions in hopes of reaching the national stage.

4. National Science Bowl

Hosted by the Department of Energy in Washington, D.C., the National Science Bowl is a highly publicized competition that tests students’ knowledge in all areas of science and mathematics, including biology, chemistry, earth science, physics, energy, and math. Students compete in teams of four (plus an alternate) and have a teacher who serves as an advisor.

The National Science Bowl is one of the largest science competitions in the country—roughly 330,000 students have participated in it throughout its 32-year history.

5. National Science Olympiad

One of the nation’s premier STEM competitions, the National Science Olympiad is the pinnacle of achievement for the country’s top Science Olympiad teams. In 2022, the U.S. top 120 teams, plus a Global Ambassador Team from Japan (for a total of more than 2,000 students) squared off in a variety of events for the chance to be named the Science Olympiad National Champions.

Teams also compete annually for the opportunity to win prizes and scholarships, including a one-time $10,000 Science Olympiad Founders’ Scholarship. About 6,000 teams compete each year, beginning at the regional level in hopes of reaching the national competition.

6. Regeneron Science Talent Search (STS)

Established in 1942 and hosted by the Society for Science, the Regeneron Science Talent Search is considered the most prestigious high school science research competition in the nation. The competition tasks young scientists with presenting their original research before a panel of nationally recognized professional scientists.

Of the 1,800 entrants, 300 Regeneron STS scholars are selected—they and their schools are awarded $2,000 each. Forty finalists are then picked from the pool of scholars. They receive an all-expenses-paid trip to Washington, D.C., where they compete for an additional $1.8 million in awards, with a top prize of $250,000.

7. Stockholm Junior Water Prize

Type: Regional, State, National, and International

In this competition, students from around the world seek to address the current and future water challenges facing the world. Competition for the Stockholm Junior Water Prize occurs on four levels: regional, state, national, and international.

• Regional winners receive a certificate and a nomination to compete in the state competition.
• State winners receive a medal and an all-expenses-paid trip to compete in the national competition.
• National winners receive a trophy, a $10,000 scholarship, and an all-expenses-paid trip to the international competition in Stockholm, Sweden.
• International winners receive a crystal trophy and a $15,000 scholarship, along with a $5,000 award for their school.

In order to participate, students can begin to research and develop a practical project proposal either as an individual or with a group. To reach the national level, students must be nominated by a national organizer representing their country.

8. TOPSS Competition for High School Psychology Students

To participate in this competition, students must submit a video of up to 3 minutes that demonstrates an interest in and understanding of a topic in psychology that they think could benefit their local community and improve lives. Students must also utilize at least one peer-reviewed research study on their topic, and must include a closing slide citing their source(s). Up to three winners are chosen to receive a $300 scholarship.

9. Junior Science and Humanities Symposium (JSHS) National Competition

Type: Regional and National

The Junior Science and Humanities Symposium National Competition is one of the country’s longest-running STEM competitions—participants are required to submit and present scientific research papers and compete for military-sponsored undergraduate scholarships.

The JSHS national competition is the result of a collaborative effort between the Department of Defense and academic research institutes nationwide. It is designed to emulate a professional symposium. Research projects are organized into categories such as Environmental Science, Engineering and Technology, and Medicine and Health. After competing regionally, about 250 students are chosen to attend an annual symposium to showcase their work.

10. MIT THINK Scholars Program

In the fall of each year, interested students can enter project proposals into competition for selection from a group of undergraduate students at MIT. If selected, students will be able to carry out their project—receiving up to $1000 in funding to complete their research. They’ll also be invited to a four-day symposium at MIT the following year.

Finalists are guided with weekly mentorship and will have the opportunity to present their findings to MIT students and faculty at the end of the program.

11. Toshiba/NSTA ExploraVision

Grades: K-12

In this competition, students compete in groups of 2-4 to select a technology and forecast how it will evolve over the next decade or beyond, while discussing the scientific achievements that will need to be made to get there.

Students will submit an abstract as well as a detailed description paper that is not to exceed 11 pages. In doing so, they will be entered into competition and considered for a number of financial awards, as well as a trip to Washington, D.C., for the ExploraVision Awards Weekend. The competition is nationally recognized and is sponsored by Toshiba and the National Science Teachers Association.

12. Conrad Challenge

Teams of 2-5 students are tasked with designing and detailing project proposals to tackle various problems categories such as Aerospace & Aviation, Health & Nutrition, Cyber-Technology & Security, and Energy & Environment. In doing so, they will identify problems in the world and come up with a feasible and innovative solution, working with judges and mentors along the way.

Finalists will be selected from the competing teams and invited to the Innovation Summit in Houston, where they will pitch their projects to judges and potentially receive numerous prizes and awards, ranging from scholarships to consulting services.

13. USA Biolympiad Competition

Type: National and International

Over the course of two years, students will undergo multiple rounds of testing that will eventually pinpoint twenty finalists to be selected for training in a residential program with the goal of representing the USA in the International Biology Olympiad. As such, this is one of the most prestigious and difficult competitions, not just in biology, but in all high school sciences. However, the experience is second to none, and is the ultimate test for students devoted to the future of biology.

14. Davidson Fellows Scholarship

While not exclusive to STEM, the Davidson Fellows program offers various major scholarships for students interested in careers in sciences. Listed as one of the “ 10 Biggest Scholarships in the World ,” this program requires students to submit a variety of components related to an independent research study with the broad goal of contributing positively to society through the advancement of science. Students will submit multiple essays as well as a video summary, and must include an additional visual model reporting their findings.

15. Destination Imagination

Type: Regional, State, National, International

Destination Imagination is another worldwide competition that includes a variety of subjects, but it specializes in science-based challenges. Students will form teams and choose from a list of different challenges to compete in in categories such as Technical, Scientific, and Engineering.

Students will solve these challenges and present their solutions in regional competitions. Regional winners will move on to statewide competitions before being invited to the Global Finals, where over 8,000 students from 28 states and 12 countries compete for awards. 150,000 students compete annually in the competition at some level.

16. Breakthrough Junior Challenge

For students looking for a more creatively inspired and unconventional competition, the Breakthrough Junior Challenge tasks students with creating a short two-minute video in which they explain and demonstrate a complex scientific concept.

Does that sound simple enough? Over 2,400 students from over 100 countries submitted videos in 2022, meaning there’s no shortage of competition here. Winning applicants will need to demonstrate immense creativity and understanding of complex scientific concepts, but rest assured—the prize is worth the difficulty.

The winner will receive a $250,000 scholarship for accredited colleges and universities, as well as a $100,000 grant to the winner’s school for the development of a science lab, and a $50,000 award to a teacher of the winner’s choosing.

17. Biotechnology Institute: BioGENEius Challenge

Students from across the country are invited to participate in the Biotechnology Institute’s BioGENEius Challenge, where they’ll be able to choose to complete a project in the Healthcare, Sustainability, or Environment categories. If accepted, students will need to complete an extensive research project and demonstrate results, and then compete in either local or a virtual “At-Large” competition, with other student competitors from around the world.

18. Genes in Space

Grades: 7-12

For students interested in the science of space and its overlap with our current understanding of the human genome, this competition combines these two worlds by tasking students with designing a DNA experiment that addresses challenges in space exploration and travel.

Students will submit a project proposal, and semifinalists will be selected to pitch their experiments in Seattle. After doing so, finalists will be selected to work with mentors and scientists from schools, such as Harvard and MIT, to design a real-life experiment. One finalist’s experiment will win the opportunity to be conducted at the International Space Station. The lucky winner will travel to the Kennedy Space Center to see the winning experiment’s launch!

19. Odyssey of the Mind

Students will form teams to compete in a variety of STEM-based challenges in this global problem-solving competition, culminating in a World Finals competition that takes place in East Lansing, Michigan.

Over 800 teams from 33 states and 15 countries compete each year in challenges ranging from designing vehicles to building small structures that can withstand hundreds of pounds. These challenges are designed to encourage creativity in the performative and presentational elements of competition.

20. U.S. National Chemistry Olympiad

Type: Regional, National, International

Students interested in Chemistry are able to participate in the USNCO, in which they’ll take rigorous exams to prove their skills in the Chemistry field. Top test-takers will be selected to attend a prestigious Study Camp, where they’ll compete for the chance to represent the U.S. at the International Chemistry Olympiad. Interested students can contact their Local Coordinator, who can be found through the program’s website.

The influence your participation in science research competitions can have on your college admissions varies—considerations such as how well you performed and the prestige of the event factor into how admissions officers view the competition. That being said, the four tiers of extracurricular activities provide a good general guide for understanding how colleges view your activities outside the classroom.

The most esteemed and well-known science research competitions are organized into Tiers 1 and 2. Extracurricular activities in these categories are extremely rare, demonstrate exceptional achievement, and hold considerable sway with admissions officers. Tiers 3 and 4 are reserved for more modest accomplishments—like winning a regional (rather than a national) competition—and carry less weight at colleges than their higher-tiered counterparts.

Generally, participation in a science research competition will be considered at least a Tier 2 activity. As stated before, this varies depending on the competition and your performance. For example, being a finalist or winner in something like the Regeneron Science Talent Search or the International Biology Olympiad—prestigious national and international competitions—is very likely to be considered a Tier 1 achievement.

However, lower-tiered extracurriculars are still valuable, as they show colleges a more well-rounded picture of you as a student, and highlight your desire to pursue your interests outside of school.

Curious how your participation in science research competitions affects your odds of college admissions? Collegevine can help. Our free chancing calculator uses factors like grades, test scores, and extracurricular activities—like science research competitions— to calculate your chances of getting into hundreds of colleges across the country! You can even use the information provided to identify where you can improve your college profile and ultimately bolster your odds of getting into your dream school.

Disclaimer: This post includes content sponsored by Lumiere Education.

Related CollegeVine Blog Posts

Main Content

Position paper submissions.

• [3]  A CANADIAN SQUARE KILOMETRE ARRAY REGIONAL CENTRE  Kristine Spekkens (RMC), Erk Rosolowsky (U of Alberta), Séverin Gaudet (NRC), Michael Rupen (NRC) and the Association of Canadian Universities for Research in Astronomy
• [104]  A Cloud Ecosystem for Canada’s Digital Research Infrastructure  Wency Lum (U of Victoria) and collaborators
• [84]  A Dynamic Environment for Medical Image Computing Research in Canada  Amber Simpson, Queen’s U, and collaborators
• [81]  A Perspective on a Canadian Digital Research Infrastructure From: McGill Centre for Integrative Neuroscience  McGill Centre for Integrative Neuroscience (MCIN)
• [45]  A Proposal to Strengthen Data Literacy in the Canada Research Data Ecosystem  Ernie Boyko and Wendy Watkins (Carleton U)
• [4]  A Standards-Based Digital Infrastructure for Secure Sharing of Human Biomedical Research Data  Lincoln Stein on behalf of Ontario Institute for Cancer Research
• [73]  A stronger Canada through digital infrastructures that support primary care research and practice improvement  The College of Family Physicians of Canada / Le Collège des médecins de famile du Canada
• [46]  ACENET's Research Directorate White Paper for NDRIO  Andrew Rutenberg on behalf of the ACENET Research Directorate
• [107]  Advancing a Framework for National Commercial Cloud Adoption in Research  Jeff Gardner (UBC), Nick Rochlin (UBC), Elizabeth Kinney (UBC)
• [22]  All Researchers Use Digital Resources: On Campus Support, Grants, Labs, and Equity  Laura Estill on behalf of St Francis Xavier University Digital Humanities Centre
• [57]  Animal Behaviour in the 21st Century: A White Paper on DRI for Animal Behaviour Research in Canada  Animal Behaviour Research in Canada – Dr. Laura Adams (Langara College) and collaborators
• [66]  BRISER LES SILOS DE DONNÉES ET DE SAVOIRS Un enjeu scientifique d’inclusion sociale et culturelle  Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM) ave la collaboration de Calcul Québec
• [33]  Beyond Virtual or Physical Environments: Building a Research Metaverse A White Paper for NDRIO’s Canadian Digital Research Needs Assessment  Paul De Decker (Memorial U) and Stephany Peterson (U of New Brunswick)
• [87]  Bilinguisme des outils et des services: soumission conjointe des Bibliothèques de l'Université Montréal et des Bibliothèques de l'Université de Toronto  Bibliothèques de l’Université de Montréal et des Bibliothèques de l’Université de Toronto
• [76]  Brandon University White Paper Submission to NDRIO  Brandon University
• [85]  Building a data science platform for better health  Laura C. Rosella (U of Toronto) and collaborators
• [53]  CSEE/CIEE Submission on the New Digital Research Infrastructure Organization  Stephen Heard and Diane Srivastava on behalf of the CSEE and CIEE
• [20]  Canada’s Future DRI Ecosystem for Humanities & Social Sciences (HSS)  Canadian Society of Digital Humanities – Geoffrey Rockwell
• [48]  Canada’s Future DRI Ecosystem: AI Research Needs  Ron Bodkin (Vector Institute)
• [25]  Canada’s Future Digital Research Infrastructure (DRI) Ecosystem: A perspective from the Bioinformatics National Team (BNT)  Bioinformatics National Team
• [11]  Canada’s Health Workforce Digital Research Infrastructure Ecosystem: Building the Foundation for Canadian Health Workforce Science & Informed Decision Making  Canadian Health Workforce Network
• [47]  Canada’s Path to a Global Open Research Commons  Karen Payne, David Castle, and Mark Leggott
• [44]  Canadian Data Repository Inventory  Peter Webster (St Mary U) and collaborators
• [83]  Canadian Digital Research Infrastructure Needs Assessment: An Agri-food Research Perspective from the University of Guelph  Emily Duncan (U of Guelph), Rozita Dara (U of Guelph), Jairo Melo (U of Guelph), Carly Huitema (U of Guelph), Beverley Hale (U of Guelph)
• [27]  Closing Canada’s “curation gap”: A national approach  Portage Curation Expert Group
• Clés pour une Infrastructure de recherche numérique (IRN) innovante  Suzanne Talon, Marie-Jean Meurs, Victor Ionescu de la part de Calcul Québec
• [51]  Comments for NDRIO  Mark Hahn (SHARCNET)
• [14]  Considerations from researchers from Université Laval  Jacques Corbeil, Francvois Laviolette and Florent Parent (U Laval)
• [41]  Creating an Audit and Feedback Loop to Monitor and Enhance Data Sharing in Canada  Felicity Tayler (U of Ottawa, Library), David Moher (Ottawa Hospital Research Institute & U of Ottawa), Kelly Cobey (Ottawa Hospital Research Institute & U of Ottawa)
• [105]  DRI Needs Assessment for the Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) Research Community  Computational Fluid Dynamics Society of Canada
• [91]  DRI, University Libraries and Digital Humanities Research Centres  Jason Boyd on behalf of Ryerson Centre for Digital Humanities
• [82]  Data Management Planning in Canada  James Doiron (U of Alberta), Maggie Neilson (Acadia U), Robyn Nicholson (Portage Network)
• [5]  Digital Health Research: Opportunities for Improving the Health of Canadians  Diabetes Action Canada
• [17]  Digital Research Infrastructure for Canadian Astronomy  Catherine Lovekin (Mount Allison U), Pauline Barmby (U of Western Ontario), J.J. Kavelaars (HIA), Adrian Liu (McGill U), Erik Rosolowsky (Uof Alberta), Kristine Spekkens (RMC), James Wadsley (McMaster U)
• [30]  Digital Research Infrastructure in Astronomy  Herzbeg Astronomy and Astrophysics Research Centre – Dr. JJ Kavelaars
• [28]  Digital preservation and NDRIO: a white paper  The Portage–Preservation Expert Group and The Canadian Association of Research Libraries–Digital Preservation Working Group
• [10]  Digital research infrastructure of two research laboratories in the field of structural dynamics  Laboratory for Acoustics and Vibration Analysis at Polytechnique Montréal and the Structural Dynamics and Vibration Laboratory at McGill University.
• [12]  Digital research infrastructure to support federated computing on large scale biomedical datasets  Guillaume Bourque (McGill U), Michael Brudno (U of Toronto), Steven JM Jones (Genome Sciences Centre, BC Cancer)
• [16]  Développer une infrastructure de services numériques pour les Humanités numériques canadiennes : livre blanc pour la NOIRN  Centre de recherche interuniversitaire sur les humanités numériques
• [24]  Empowering Information Systems and Fostering Metadata Driven Data Management  Pascal Heus
• [60]  Enabling broad reuse of Canada’s geospatial data and digitized cartographic materials  Association of the Canadian Map Libraries and Archives (ACMLA) – Jay Brodeur and team
• [43]  Ensuring access to Canada’s core historical data collections in the social sciences and humanities: possibilities emerging from the Canadian Census Discovery Partnership  Leanne Trimble (U of Toronto) and collaborators
• [59]  Federating innovation in Digital Research Infrastructure accessibility  Julie faure-Lacroix (Calcul Québec), Félix-Antoine Fortin (U Laval), Florent Parent (Calcul Québec-U Laval), Darren Boss (Compute Canada), Drew Leske (Compute Canada)
• [8]  Future-Proofing the Canadian DRI/RDM Ecosystem through Openness and Collaboration  Canadian Association of Research Libraries
• [15]  Gaps and Opportunities for NDRIO Support of Research Data Management: Insights from the Global Water Futures Data Managers  Global Water Futures Data Managers – K. Dukacz and collaborators
• [18]  Gaps in Digital Research Infrastructure for Canadian Digital Humanities Researchers  Lawrence Evalyn (U of Toronto), Elizabeth Parke (U of Toronto), Patrick Keilty (U of Toronto), Elspeth Brown (U of Toronto)
• [61]  Genomics Digital Research Infrastructure to Support Canadian Competitiveness  Genome Canada
• [55]  HQP Pathways: Engaging the Canada’s Different Disciplinary Models for HQP Training and Funding to Facilitate DRI Uptake in Canada  Ray Siemens and Alyssa Arbuckle on behalf of the Digital Humanities Summer Institute Directorial Group
• [37]  Improving the Discovery of Access-Limited Data  Kevin Read ( U of Saskatchewan), Amber Leahey (Scholars Portal), Sarah Rutley (U of Saskatchewan), Victoria Smith (Portage Network), Kelly Stathis (Portage Network)
• [29]  Indigenous Language Technologies and Online Resources: Algonquian Dictionaries Project and Algonqian Linguistic Atlas  Marie-Odile Junker & Delasie Torkornoo (Carleton U)
• [52]  Individuals, communities and population health digital research infrastructure: incorporating primary care electronic medical record data as part of a primary health care information system  Canadian Primary Care Sentinel Surveillance Network (CPCSSN) – Sabrina T. Wong and collaborators
• [54]  Interface Matters  Canadian Writing Research Collaboratory – Jeffrey Antoniuk and Susan Brown
• [56]  L'Infrastructure Numérique en Recherche  Décanat de la Recherche et de la Création, UQAC
• [19]  Large-Parallel Supercomputer Simulations – Frontiers in Canadian Research  Rodrigo Fernández (U of Alberta) and 16 supercomputing researchers
• [31]  Les besoins de l’écosystème de l’infrastructure de recherche numérique canadienne  University of Ottawa
• Les consortiums régionaux de bibliothèques universitaires sont des partenaires clés qui contribuent à la mise en place d’une infrastructure de recherche numérique durable et réactive  Vivian Stieda (COPPUL), Sonia Seck (BCI), Cynthia Holt (CBUA-CAUL)
• [100]  Livre blanc sur l'infrastructure de recherche numérique : perspective de la Faculté des sciences de l'UQAM  Faculté des science de l’UQAM White Paper McMaster Angela Di Nello, Research & High-Performance Computing Support (McMaster U)
• [70]  NDRIO Cartik Sharma Proposal  Cartik Sharma
• [101]  NDRIO White Paper  Cape Breton University
• [2]  NDRIO White Paper: Bridging the Accessibility Gap  University of Waterloo
• [71]  NDRIO White Paper: Envisioning Digital Research Infrastructure for the Simons Observatory  Adam Hincks (U of Toronto) and collaborators on behalf of The Simons Observatory
• NDRIO: Call for Position Papers on Canada’s Future DRI Ecosystem  Ontario Council of University Libraries
• [72]  NDRIO: Limit Corporate Influence, Maximize Public Involvement and Accountability  Catherine Stinson (Queen’s U) and collaborators
• [78]  National Research Data Infrastructure in the context of Truth and Reconciliation  Ry Moran (U of Victoria)
• [68]  New Digital Research Infrastructure Organization White Paper submission  Faculty of Dentistry, McGill U – Svetlana Komarova
• [88]  ORION Digital research infrastructure for Canada  ORION Network
• [80]  On Canada’s Future Digital Research Infrastructure  Dr Ross Dickson
• [38]  On the Need for Local Research Software Development Funding  Dr. Andrew Schoenrock, Research Computing Services (Carleton U)
• [7]  Ontario Primary Care Learning Network: ORACLE; EMR data to support research, quality improvement and innovation  Ontario Primary Care Learning Network: ORACLE
• [86]  PHI-Compliant Computing and Storage: a critical need for Canadian biomedical and health research  Richard F. Wintle and colleagues for The Centre for Applied Genomics/The Hospital for Sick Children
• [89]  People, Platforms, and Content: The Importance of Libraries in the Emerging National DRI  The University of Toronto Libraries (UTL)
• [90]  Persistent Identifiers in Canada – Position Paper  Eugene Barsky, Head, Research Commons, UBC, on behalf of the ORCID Canada Consortium, DataCite Canada Consortium, and the Canadian Research Data Management Community
• [6]  Persistent Identifiers in Canada: ORCID-CA and DataCite Canada  John Aspler, ORCID-CA, on behalf of ORCID Canada Consortium, DataCite Canada Consortium, and the Canadian Persistent Identifier Committee
• [35]  Population Health Digital Research Infrastructure: Building Up and Out from a Learning Collaborative Network  Health Data Research Network Canada
• [79]  Racism’s trojan horse: race-based data, health care, and risks to Black and racialized populations  LLana James (U of Toronto)
• [36]  Regional Academic Library Consortia as key partners in building sustainable, responsive Digital Research Infrastructure  Regional Academic Library Consortia
• [9]  Research Information Management Integration for Canada  Eugene Barsky, Research Commons (UBC)
• [67]  Response to NDRIO Call for Position Papers on Canada’s Future DRI Ecosystem  McGill University
• [62]  Role for NDRIO in advancing open data sharing and the use of domain-specific repositories  The Gordon Foundation – Carolyn DuBois and collaborators
• [99]  Role of TRIUMF within the Digital Research Infrastructure Ecosystem  On behalf of TRIUMF: Jonathan A. Bagger, Director; Reiner Kruecken, Deputy Director, Research; and Reda Tafirout, Head, Scientific Computing
• [77]  SOSCIP Consortium on the Importance of Driving Industry Innovation with Canada’s New Digital Research Infrastructure  SOSCIP Consortium
• [42]  Software support for ARC infrastructure  Ryan Taylor (U of Victoria)
• [74]  Standardized, linkable, analysis-ready environmental data for understanding and preventing disease and building resilience to climate change  Jeffrey R. Broo, Dany Doiron, Eleanor Setton (Canadian Urban Environmental Health Research Consortium)
• [63]  Steps to Success in Ensuring DRI Engages and Mobilizes Humanities and Social Science Research  Ray Siemens and Alyssa Arbuckle on behalf of the Implementing New Knowledge Environments Partnership
• [39]  Strengthening Capacity to Manage, Secure and Protect Sensitive Research Data  The Portage Expert Group on Sensitive Data
• [21]  Submission to NDRIO’s Call for Position Papers on Canada’s Future DRI Ecosystem from the Compute Canada Federation Subatomic Physics National Team  Leslie Groer on behalf of the Compute Canada Federation Subatomic Physics National Team
• [93]  Successes and shortfalls of the current Canadian ARC platform and ideas to improve it further  Maxime Boissonneault. Ph.D.
• [95]  The Canadian Primary care Information Network: Harnessing primary health care data to improve practice  Canadian Primary care Information Network
• [96]  The Canadian Research Data Centre Network (CRDCN) in Canada’s DRI Ecosystem  Dr. Byron G Spencer on behalf of CRDCN
• [50]  The Future of Cloud as DRI  Deborah Stacey on behalf of the Linked Infrastructure for Networked Cultural Scholarship project
• [97]  The Importance of Distributed ARC HQP  Chris Loken on behalf of Compute Ontario
• [98]  The Need for First Nations Collaboration and Co-development in Digital Research Infrastructure (DRI)  First Nations Information Governance Centre
• [32]  The Needs of Canada’s Future Digital Research Infrastructure Ecosystem  University of Ottawa
• [23]  The need for expanding spatial data capabilities: Challenges and opportunities  Dr. Ines Hessler, ACENET
• [26]  The opportunities of Decentralized Resource Identifiers in the research landscape  Carly Huitema (U of Waterloo) and collaborators
• [34]  Toward Petabyte Scale Open Neuroscience: UBC Dynamic Brain Circuits Research Excellence Cluster Experience  UBC Dynamic Brain Circuits in Health and Disease Research Excellence Cluster
• [75]  Towards Research Platform as a Service (RPaaS) initiatives  Carol Gauthier (U de Sherbrooke) and collaborators
• [40]  Towards an Ideal Digital Research Infrastructure (DRI)  Robyn Stobbs and Vivekanandan Kumar (Athabasca University)
• [65]  University of Alberta response to NDRIO call for CDN DRI needs assessment white papers  University of Alberta
• [92]  White Paper on Canada's Future DRI Ecosystem: Subatomic Physics in Canada  Prof. Randall Sobie, University of Victoria, on behalf of the Institute of Particle and the Canadian Institute of Nuclear Physics
• [94]  White Paper: Building and Supporting the Use of Digital Research Infrastructure Among Qualitative Researchers  Katherine Tamminen ( U of Toronto), Heidi Bohaker (U of Toronto), Andrea Bundon (U of British Columbia), Denise Gastaldo ( U Toronto), Brenda Gladstone (U of Toronto), Cara Krmpotich (U of Toronto), Meghan McDonough (U of Calgary), Brett Smith (Durham U)
• [69]  White Paper: Open Database Support and Curation  Nicholas Probart (U of Toronto), Gary Bader (U of Toronto), Lincoln Stein (OICR), Michael Brudno (H for Sick Children)
• [13]  iReceptor – A case study in the challenges/opportunities in Canadian DRI  Felix Breden and Brian Corrie (iReceptor)
• [58]  Écosystème D’infrastructure De Recherche Numérique Pour Les Données De La Recherche Vision Du Sous-Comité Des Bibliothèques Du BCI  BCI
• [64]  Évaluation canadienne des besoins en matière de recherche numérique – Livre blanc de l’École nationale d’administration publique, l’Institut national de la recherche scientifique et l’Université TÉLUQ  École nationale d’administration publique (ENAP), Institut national de la recherche scientifique (INRS), Université TÉLUQ
• [1]  “Good Things Come in Small Packets”: How (Inter)national Digital Research Infrastructure can support “Small Data” Humanities and Cultural Heritage research  Daniel Paul O’Donnel (U of Lethbridge)

Disclaimer: The submitted Position Papers above are being shared in their original language and will not be translated as they are not Alliance-owned content

• Student Chapters
• Student Membership
• Scholarships & Awards
• Become a member
• Atlantic Canada
• BC Interior Section
• Greater Vancouver
• National Capital
• Northern Alberta
• Saskatchewan
• Southern Alberta
• Southwestern Ontario
• Vancouver Island
• View Student Chapters
• News & Events
• Annual Conference
• Upcoming Events
• Latest News
• Transportation Talk
• Transportation Talk Magazine
• Advertise & Sponsor
• Career Development
• Career Connect with Kate
• Resource Library
• ITE Bookstore
• Professional & Technical Awards
• Student Scholarships & Awards
• Section/Chapter Awards
• About ITE Canada
• Support ITE Canada

Student Paper Competition Award

Home / Scholarships and Awards / Student Scholarships & Awards / Student Paper Competition Award

Scholarships and Awards

• Dr. Michel Van Aerde Memorial Transportation Scholarship
• John Vardon Memorial Transportation Scholarship
• ITE Canada Undergraduate Scholarship
• ITE Canada/WATT Consulting Group “Transportation in a Sustainable World” Student Award
• Student Presentation Competition Award
• ITE Canada Collegiate Traffic Bowl
• Past Awards & Competitions
• Robert Burton Distinguished Service
• Outstanding Voluntary Contribution
• Rising Star
• David Tam Memorial Award
• Stan Teply Outstanding Technical Project
• ITE Transportation Achievement Awards
• Jenn and Jan Voss Travel Bursary for Women in Transportation Engineering
• Section Awards
• Student Chapter Awards
• CCG Competition

Each year, ITE Canada offers a Student Paper Award to students in accredited transportation programs at Canadian universities and colleges. The purpose of the Student Paper Award is to encourage students to develop their technical writing skills, and to provide a means for the Institute to recognize outstanding accomplishments in such activities. This award is based on the technical merit and writing ability demonstrated in the paper.  Please note the following:

• Must address a transportation topic
• Must be authored by one student author; advisors can be listed but CANNOT be co-authors
• Paper must be submitted in English
• A PDF document in 11 pt. type, with a maximum of 3,000 words
• Paper must include a title page showing, title, author’s name, address, telephone number and date, and a table of contents

Stantec provides an annual award of $1,500 (CDN) comprised of a $500 honorarium. The winner will also receive free registration to the annual conference (in the year of award), reimbursement of travel expenses (up to $1000 if recipient resides outside of conference region, up to $100 if recipient resides within conference region), recognition at the Annual Awards Luncheon, and the paper will also be published online (see names linked below).

The winning paper is also entered into the competition for the ITE International Daniel B. Fambro Student Paper Award where the winner receives up to $1,000 (U.S.) to reimburse expenses to attend the ITE International Conference where they will be presented the award.

Applicants for the Student Paper Award must be members of ITE, and have completed the work that provides the basis for the paper while a student member of ITE. The student must also be the sole author.

Evaluation Criteria

• Originality (20 points) – To what degree does the subject matter and conclusions treat new ideas or call for significant departure from the present state of the art? How imaginative and original was the approach? How extensive were the qualities of inventiveness and ingenuity used?
• Significance (20 points) – To what extent is the paper a major contribution to transportation engineering?
• Scope and Forma t (20 points) – To what degree is the paper complete in relation to its stated purpose? Is the paper well organized? Is the paper concise?
• Validity (20 points) – How sound are the approach techniques, data used, and the reasoning applied?
• Applicability (20 points) – To what degree can the conclusions reached in the paper be applied in a practical manner towards solving transportation engineering problems?

Application deadline is March 1st.

For further information, contact us .

Past Recipients

2023 – Maryam Hasanpour, Toronto Metropolitan University 2022 – Mingjian Wu , University of Alberta 2021 – Mingjian Wu , University of Alberta 2020 – Anastasia Soukov , McMaster University 2019 – Not awarded 2018 – Ahmed Osama Amer , University of British Columbia 2017 –  Caleb Olfert , University of Manitoba 2016 –  Caitlin Sowers 2015 – James Lamers 2014 – Md (Monir) Moniruzzaman 2013 – Erin Toop 2012 – Amir Ghods 2011 – David Duong 2010 – Feng Wei 2009 – Trevor Hanson , English competition 2009 – Louiselle Sioui , French competition 2008 – Maury Steindel 2007 – Jonathan Lewis 2006 – Bjorn Radstrom 2005 – Tyler Golly 2004 – Eugene Chen 2003 – Vikki Ngan 1993 – Gene Chartier

Language selection

• Français fr

WxT Search form

Research papers.

Some of the Strategy, Research and Results Branch's research papers are published under the Branch's Working Paper Series, as a means of diffusing research findings from Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada projects for discussion and comment.

Other research, including commissioned work done by experts in their fields, can be found in a range of external publishing channels, including academic journals, books and university websites.

If you have general enquiries, please contact us .

• The fragmentation of business activities in global value chains as a source of performance for Canadian enterprises by Julio Rosa and Stéphane Jetté
• Competition in Canadian Telecommunications Industry: A market Evaluation Approach by Ryan Kelly and Hankook Kim
• Drivers of Wireless Diffusion and Price by Daniel Ershov and Hankook Kim
• Age-Productivity Profiles of Entrants and Exits: Evidence from Canadian Manufacturing by Huju Liu and Jianmin Tang
• Industrial Structure Change and the Widening Canada-U.S. Labour Productivity Gap in the Post-2000 Period by Jianmin Tang
• Direct and Indirect Support to Business R&D , by Charles Bérubé and Pierre Therrien
• Employment and Productivity: Exploring the Trade-off by Jianmin Tang
• Industry Productivity in the Manufacturing Sector: The Role of Offshoring by Aaron Sydor, Jianmin Tang and Lydia Couture
• Drivers of Innovation, Complementarity of Innovation and Performance of Enterprises in Canada , by Dany Brouillette
• Management Practices, Competition, Innovation and the Performance of Enterprises in Canada , by Dany Brouillette and Daniel Ershov
• Industry Structure Change and the Post-2000 Economic Growth Slowdown: A Canada-U.S. Comparison , by Michael-John Almon and Jianmin Tang
• Are Small or Large Producers Driving the Canada-U.S. Labour Productivity Gap? Recent Evidence from Manufacturing , by Jianmin Tang
• Industry Mix, Plant Turnover and Productivity Growth: A Case Study of the Electronic and Electrical Product Manufacturing Industry , by Kelvin Ka Yin Chan , Wulong Gu and Jianmin Tang
• Estimating the Incremental Impacts of a Provincial R&D Tax Credit on Business R&D Expenditures Using a Natural Experiment in British Columbia , by Dany  Brouillette
• The Distribution of Employment Growth Rates in Canada: the Role of High-growth and Rapidly Shrinking Firms, 2000 to 2009 , by Jay Dixon and Anne-Marie Rollin
• Venture Capital as a Catalyst for High Growth , by Ryan Kelly and Hankook Kim
• Unbundling Canada's Weak Productivity Performance: A Review of the Issues by Susanto Basu
• Do Very Large Producers Contribute to the Canada-U.S. Productivity Gap? Evidence from Manufacturing by Michael-John Almon and Jianmin Tang
• International Competition, R&D Investment Patterns, and Endogenous Sunk Costs in Canada and the United States, 1987–2002 by Daniel Ershov
• Impacts of Structural Changes in the Canadian Economy by Ronald Hirshhorn
• Management and Productivity in Canada: What does the Evidence Say? by Nicholas Bloom
• ICT and Total Factor Productivity Growth: Intangible Capital or Productive Externalities?—Archived by Ram Acharya
• R&D Spending and M&E Investment in Canadian Manufacturing Industries—Archived , by Malick Souare and Weimin Wang
• Are Canadian Industries Moving Up the Value Chain?—Archived , by Malick Souare and Weimin Wang

Banting Postdoctoral Fellowship 2024 competition launched

The prestigious Banting Postdoctoral Fellowship for the 2024-2025 competition has been officially launched!

This fellowship program provides funding to outstanding postdoctoral applicants, both nationally and internationally, who contribute significantly to Canada’s economic, social, and research-based growth. 

Fellowship Value and Duration

• Each fellowship is valued at $70,000 per year for two years. 
• It is one of the most competitive among all Canadian tri-agency postdoctoral opportunities. 
• Only 70 fellowships are available annually across Canada. 

Additional Benefits

• The University also provides $10,000 per year in research funding. 
• Fellows have access to $5,000 in leadership incentive funds. 
• University-paid extended health care benefit plan. 

Application Process

Applicants for a Banting Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Waterloo must secure the endorsement of a Waterloo supervisor(s). 

The recommended deadline for endorsement is June. 

The final application deadline is June 26. 

For further details on Waterloo’s application process and timelines, visit the Banting Postdoctoral Fellowship timeline web page .  

News by audience

• Course-based master's (4)
• Current undergraduate students (1)
• Current graduate students (55)
• Future graduate students (1)
• Faculty (12)
• Parents (3)
• Donors | Friends | Supporters (3)

News archive

• February (7)
• January (1)
• November (1)
• October (4)
• September (6)
• February (5)
• January (2)
• December (3)
• November (2)
• October (2)
• September (4)
• February (6)
• January (9)

Graduate Studies and Postdoctoral Affairs (GSPA)

Needles Hall, second floor, room 2201

Graduate Studies Academic Calendar

Website feedback

• Contact Waterloo
• Maps & Directions
• Accessibility

The University of Waterloo acknowledges that much of our work takes place on the traditional territory of the Neutral, Anishinaabeg and Haudenosaunee peoples. Our main campus is situated on the Haldimand Tract, the land granted to the Six Nations that includes six miles on each side of the Grand River. Our active work toward reconciliation takes place across our campuses through research, learning, teaching, and community building, and is co-ordinated within the Office of Indigenous Relations .

Aiyana Fortin selected as finalist for 2024 SB3C Student Paper Competition

Congrats to Aiyana Fortin @FortinAiyana for being selected as a finalist for the 2024 SB3C Student Paper Competition! This work examines the intra-tissue and intra-cellular uptake and retention kinetics of C’ Dot nanoparticles for therapeutic applications in knee osteoarthritis.

#osteoarthritis @GroupWiesner @CornellBME   @CornellMSE

Aiyana Geimer Fortin

Language selection

• Français fr

National Student Paper Competition

Connecting talented graduates with the Government of Canada

The 2023–2024 National Student Paper Competition is currently closed to new applications until further notice.

The National Student Paper Competition (NSPC) , an annual competition, offers a unique opportunity for talented graduate students to connect with senior public servants, expand their networks, nurture their leadership skills, and foster employment opportunities with the federal public service.

For more information about the competition or the submission process, contact the NSPC team at nspc‑cneu@csps‑efpc.gc.ca .

Background information

Launched in 2013, the NSPC is an annual competition organized by the Canada School of Public Service in partnership with the  Canadian Association of Programs in Public Administration  and the  Institute of Public Administration of Canada . The competition is also supported by various Canadian higher-education institutions and associations, including the  Canadian Association for Graduate Studies .

The aim of the competition is two-fold:

• introducing innovative ideas and bright new thinkers to the Canadian public service
• enhancing public service excellence and encouraging high performance

Benefits and outcomes of the competition

• A strong partnership between the federal public service, universities and higher-education associations that encourages graduate students to apply academic knowledge and skills to inform Canadian public policy and the Public Service of Canada.
• An increased number of promising graduate students in different fields of expertise across Canadian universities working with the federal public service and contributing with innovative, research-based ideas to enhance the lives of all Canadians.
• A talented, diverse, inclusive and modern workforce equipped with the skills needed to embrace new workplace challenges, design services, mobilize knowledge, and respond to the country's evolving needs.

Learn more about the benefits of this initiative:

Video: National Student Paper Competition Government executives and past winners highlight the benefits of the National Student Paper Competition.

The Grand Prize winner(s) of the competition will receive the following:

• A 4-month internship with the Canadian federal public service (staffing mechanism depends on individual situation)
• Invitations to attend or present at academic and governmental conferences and panels

The winner and the top five finalists will:

• receive a certificate of achievement signed by the President of the Canada School of Public Service
• have their paper posted on the  Canadian Association of Programs in Public Administration (CAPPA) website  in both official languages

Winner of the 10th National Student Paper Competition - Lydia Laflamme (2022‑2023) Lydia Laflamme, one of two winners of the 10th National Student Paper Competition, is a master's student in political science at Université Laval in Québec. She is a member of the Research Chair on Democracy and Parliamentary Institutions, the Université Laval Research Group in Politics and Cognition, and the Leadership Chair in the Teaching of Digital Social Sciences. Her main areas of research are political psychology and electoral politics in Quebec and the rest of Canada. More specifically, she studies intergroup conflict, the impact of identity on political attitudes, and the connections between voter well-being and behaviour. 

Visit the Canadian Association of Programs in Public Administration (CAPPA) to read the paper written by Lydia Laflamme.

Winner of the 10th National Student Paper Competition - David Jones (2022‑2023) David Jones, one of two winners of the 10th National Student Paper Competition, is a policy analyst and advisor, specializing in economics, healthcare and public policy. Currently, David is midway through the Master of Public Policy degree at the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy. He also studied Economics at the University of Cambridge. David is passionate about providing high-quality research, analysis and advice that both supports efficient policymaking and improves the welfare of society.

Visit the Canadian Association of Programs in Public Administration (CAPPA) to read the paper written by David Jones.

Video: Winner of the 9th National Student Paper Competition - Aisha Barkhad (2021-2022) Graduate student Aisha Barkhad, winner of the 9th National Student Paper Competition, answers a series of questions about her experience during and after the competition. 

Video: Winner of the 8th National Student Paper Competition - Bhajan Gill (2020-2021) Bhajan Gill, winner of the 8th National Student Paper Competition and currently a policy analyst with the Canada School of Public Service, answers a series of questions about her experience during and after the competition.

Visit the CAPPA website to learn more about the top papers from past editions of the NSPC.

Application process

• Are you a talented Canadian graduate student looking for an opportunity to apply your knowledge to advance the federal public service?
• Are you interested in building your network by connecting with senior officials in the Government of Canada?
• Do you have an inspiring and innovative idea that can improve a Canadian policy or program?

If you answered "yes" to any of these questions, consider applying to the NSPC.

• Canadian citizens or permanent residents of Canada
• Graduate (master's and PhD) students enrolled in a publicly funded Canadian university for at least one academic term during the 2023-2024 academic year, on a full-time or part-time basis
• Team applications, with a maximum of two members, are permitted, although, all members must meet the above requirements. A team application that includes collaborators from other universities is permitted.

The NSPC initiative is committed to contributing to a more equitable, diverse, and inclusive Canadian public service. We strongly encourage the participation of students from equity-seeking groups, including graduate students with disabilities, 2SLGBTQI+ students and BIPOC students.

If you are interested in participating in the NSPC, you should:

• Contact a professor or supervisor in your Canadian university department, program or faculty to seek support
• Submit the paper to the professor or supervisor, who should then complete the online application form and submit three versions of the paper.

The NSPC is designed to allow graduate students to share inspiring and innovative ideas on topics related to governance and the Public Service of Canada. Papers should focus on the current priorities and concerns of the Government of Canada. All submissions on any other issue relevant to the federal public service are also welcome. To understand our current priorities, see in particular:

• The Speech from the Throne , which identifies government-wide priorities or objectives
• The Clerk's Annual Report to the Prime Minister on the Public Service of Canada
• Various departmental plans and reports
• Ministerial mandate letters

More information is available on the websites of the Privy Council Office and the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat .

Each paper should be a forward-looking think piece that explores innovative ideas and approaches to help position Canada and Canadians for the coming decade through solutions delivered by the Government of Canada.

In determining the paper's topic, applicants may want to consider the following questions:

• What are your ideas about how to ensure that the public service is ready to meet the needs of the future?
• What are the major social, economic, technological and/or environmental challenges facing Canada in the next decade? What policy strategies should Canada pursue to address them?
• What emerging topics will have a significant impact on the federal public service and service excellence for Canadians?
• What would it take to move your idea from policy approval to implementation?

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Quality of life and the well-being of Canadians
• Ethics and Values in the Public Service
• Anti-racism, equity, diversity and inclusion
• Government and democracy
• Federalism in Canada
• Digital government and artificial intelligence
• Climate change and sustainable development
• Indigenous affairs and reconciliation
• Public administration innovation and partnerships
• Canadian policies and program improvement
• Geopolitics, trade and National Security
• Skills development and the future of work

Submitted papers must meet the following  technical requirements:

• A single-authored or co-authored paper, either in English or in French
• A new work or one adapted from an earlier original academic course or academic research work
• A maximum of 1500 words (excluding the cover page, bibliography, footnotes/endnotes, appendices or any tables, charts and figures)
• Essay format using any standard citation style
• cover page with the paper's title and word count
• author's name and email address
• university and program of study
• name and institutional email address of professor or supervisor who is submitting on behalf of their student
• Identical content to PDF version
• cover page with only the title of the paper and the word count. Do not include the author's name and university.
• 1. Find a professor or supervisor from your university program to endorse the paper and provide necessary information. (See application form.)
• 2. Define a topic for the paper based on the competition criteria.
• 3.1 The paper is a maximum of 1500 words, excluding the cover page, bibliography, footnotes/endnotes, appendices or any tables, charts and figures.
• 3.2 The paper follows an essay format.
• 3.3 The paper uses a standard citation style.
• 4.1 PDF format: A cover page formatted with cover page including title, author names, email addresses, word count, university, and author university program. Name and institutional email address of professor or supervisor.
• 4.2 MS Word format: A cover page formatted with cover page including title, author names, email addresses, word count, university, and author university program. Name and institutional email address of professor or supervisor.
• 4.3 MS Word format: A cover page with name of paper and word count only, omitting author name and university.

Evaluation process

The submitted papers will be evaluated using the matrix below.

After all submissions have been evaluated and the scores for each essay have been tallied, the authors of the five highest-scoring essays will be selected.

To determine the winner, the top five finalists will be asked to present their research to a panel of senior government executives. The panel will evaluate and rank the presentations to determine the winner based on their:

• articulation of knowledge and integrated skills
• ability to communicate, argue and defend innovative ideas
• confidence and collaborative interaction with the panellists
• willingness to propose meaningful policy recommendations to inform and enhance the federal public service and Canadian society

This competition is designed to remove barriers, ensure a fair assessment, and allow all candidates to fully demonstrate their competencies. Accommodation measures are available to applicants upon request by email or voluntary indication on the online submissions.

Event: Recognizing the Resilience of Indigenous Women and the 2SLGBTQIA+ Community

Event: GBA Plus in Action: Respect, Relationships, and Intersectional Leadership in Gwaii Haanas

Event: Privacy Awareness Week 2024: Navigating Privacy in the Digital Workplace

• GCLearning newsletter

Recent UW Law Faculty Scholarship: Supervising Sentencing; Robust Electoral Competition: Rethinking Electoral Systems to Encourage Representative Outcomes; Independence Reconceived; Is the Constitution of 1787 a White Supremacist Document? Against Essentialism in Constitutional Interpretation; and May 30, 1787

Here is the latest faculty scholarship appearing in the  University of Wisconsin Law School Legal Studies Research Papers series  found on SSRN.

• Supervising Sentencing 57 UC Davis L. Rev. (2024) by RENAGH O’LEARY , UW Law School

Community supervision agencies and officers do not just supervise people on probation and parole. They also play a unique and privileged role at sentencing. In nearly every state, community supervision officers investigate and write the presentence report, which is often the judge’s primary source of information about the defendant and the crime of conviction. With minimal guidance from legislatures or courts, community supervision agencies set the policies that govern the presentence investigation and report process.

This Article offers a descriptive and theoretical account of community supervision’s sentencing role in state courts. My account is based on an analysis of statutes, court rules, and a collection of almost 200 internal community supervision agency policy documents obtained through open records requests to community supervision agencies in every state. I find that community supervision agencies and officers do not simply implement sentencing policy; in key respects, they make it.

In their sentencing role, community supervision agencies and officers take positions on highly contested first-order questions about the sentencing process itself: what goals, values, and assumptions should guide sentencing decisions? What types of facts should sentencing judges consider? How should those facts be found, and what meaning do they support? I argue that community supervision’s answers to these questions both reflect and reinforce what I describe as a punitive perspective on the sentencing process: one that sees the criminal legal system as just, criminal punishment as socially beneficial, and criminal defendants as moral failures. Community supervision’s sentencing role elevates the punitive perspective on the pretense of neutrality and, by doing so, helps to insulate it from challenge and critique.

• Robust Electoral Competition: Rethinking Electoral Systems to Encourage Representative Outcomes Univ. Wis. Legal Studies Research Paper No. 1798 (2024) by NATHAN ATKINSON , UW Law School, and Scott Ganz, Georgetown University- McDonough School of Business

American democracy is struggling. Political polarization has exacerbated division within the electorate, while gerrymandering and hyper-polarization mean only a handful of elections are truly competitive. Voters feel increasingly disenchanted with the major parties and starved for choice. Hungry for solutions, states have turned to a particular form of Ranked Choice Voting called Instant Runoff Voting, now adopted in two states and on the ballot on more this fall. Its promise of greater choice holds intuitive appeal to those interested in improving American democratic institutions.

This article sounds the alarm that the rush to reform by adopting Instant Runoff Voting may prove misguided. Well-intentioned advocates have backed a system that treats symptoms, not the root causes of democratic disfunction. We reframe the discussion in terms of robust electoral competition, evaluating voting systems on their incentive structures shaping the political positioning of candidates’ platforms and the extent to which those platforms are responsive to the will of the voters. On those metrics, we argue, the form of Ranked Choice Voting spreading across the country comes up short in much the same ways that our current plurality system fails.

We provide a two-part corrective. On a theoretical level, we offer a framework that ties the representativeness of an electoral system to the degree to which it promotes political competition. We show how alternative voting systems can create stronger competitive pressures resulting in more representative election outcomes. On a practical level, we show an alternative Ranked Choice system called Condorcet voting could restore lost incentives within existing constraints. Unlike our current plurality system or Instant Runoff Voting, Condorcet voting ensures that a candidate preferred by a majority over others must win, thereby creating strong competitive pressures resulting in more representative outcomes. We map a feasible path toward revived democratic responsiveness.

• Independence Reconceived 2023 Columbia Bus. L. Rev. (2023) by YARON NILI , UW Law School, and Claire A. Hill, University of Minnesota Law School

What makes a director independent? Scholars, regulators, and investors have grappled for decades with the fleeting notion of director independence. Originally conceived as guardians of shareholder interests that could safeguard a corporate board’s ability to check management’s power, independent directors have become a marquee feature of modern corporate governance. But do the corporate actions of directors that are considered “independent” under current standards comport with what we think independence requires? In many cases, the answer would seem to be “no.” From a lack of observable financial impact to the unabated flow of corporate scandals, independent directors seem to keep failing at the job they were championed to do.

This Article addresses this puzzling tension, offering a novel theoretical and practical reframing of the decades-old discourse around independent directors. The historical focus on the classical managerial agency costs paradigm emphasized that directors who lack ties to the management team can prevent managerial slack or value extraction. However, this approach overlooks the critical role directors also have in curbing managerial overzealousness. In today’s governance ecosystem, directors are not only tasked with preventing managerial slack. They are increasingly tasked with preventing managerial overreach and misconduct even when such overreach or misconduct is compatible with promoting shareholder value. This has important theoretical and practical implications.

This Article makes two key contributions to the literature. First, it reframes the question of what makes directors independent by supplementing the focus on agency costs as the driver for independence. By identifying a need to prevent boards from rubber-stamping managerial actions—even those taken in good faith—this Article suggests that a simple lack of ties to management fails as a litmus test for independence. Second, by reconceiving independence, this Article also provides tangible credence to the value of diversity on boards, the value and perils of hedge fund activism, and to the emerging discourse regarding ESG and stakeholderism.

• Is the Constitution of 1787 a White Supremacist Document? Against Essentialism in Constitutional Interpretation 33 William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal (2024) by DAVID S. SCHWARTZ , UW Law School

A curious convergence is emerging in legal academia around the conclusion that the 1787 Constitution is a white supremacist document. Although most originalists would deny that contention, their methodology strongly favors, if it does not compel, an agreement with progressive, “neo-Garrisonian” scholars that the Constitution of 1787 is indeed a white supremacist document. Both the neo-Garrisonian and originalist elements of this implicit convergence stem from their “essentialism” in Constitutional interpretation: the idea that the Constitution or its terms or provisions carry a uniquely and objectively correct meaning, invariant over time, and independent of our evolving normative commitments. This essay argues that essentialism is a mistaken approach to constitutional interpretation. Contrasting Chief Justice Roger Taney’s lead opinion in Dred Scott, holding that Black people cannot be “citizens” of the United States, with Frederick Douglass’s Glasgow Speech, arguing that the Constitution is not a pro-slavery document, this essay argues that these two texts embody not simply a clash of conclusions, but also a clash of approaches to understanding what the Constitution is. Taney’s opinion is archetypally originalist and essentialist; Douglass’s speech, widely misunderstood as an essentialist, textualist argument, is in fact a powerful anti-essentialist argument that the Constitution of 1787 was an invitation to struggle over the questions of slavery and white supremacy. The essay further disputes the widely accepted neo-Garrisonian claim that originalism and living constitutionalism both fail the Dred Scott “test.” While living constitutionalism, with its embrace of evolving moral values, would today reject Dred Scott, Taney’s originalist opinion adheres to the tenets of the intentionalist and public meaning strands of originalism and meets present-day professional standards of originalist scholarship. Thus, while living constitutionalism can, originalism cannot disown Dred Scott.

• May 30, 1787 Univ. Wis. Legal Studies Research Paper No. 1801 (2024) by DAVID S. SCHWARTZ , UW Law School

In Federalist 39, James Madison characterized the proposed Constitution as “partly national, and partly federal.” The federalism debates that have dominated constitutional law and politics from the beginning of the republic to the present play out the tensions between, and relative weights of, these “national” and “federal” elements. The history of U.S. constitutional politics is one in which the nationalism of the Philadelphia Convention was rhetorically downplayed in the ratification debates, and then significantly rolled back by erstwhile Anti-Federalists who became ascendant after the election of 1800. The dominance of the Anti-Federalist-influenced Jeffersonian Republican party after 1800 habituated our constitutional order to an ideology of federalism that, to this day, exaggerates the Constitution’s original commitment to its “partly federal” character. Our understanding of U.S. federalism and its history is doomed to incompleteness, if not distortion, without a proper account of the evolution the word “federal” in our constitutional order, from its origin as a descriptor of the decentralized Confederation system to a descriptor of today’s predominantly centralized national government. This essay offers a first step toward a semantic or etymological history of the word “federal,” by describing and analyzing the first significant appearance of the words “national” and “federal” at the outset of the Philadelphia Convention. I argue that, to the Framers, “federal” referred to the Confederation system that they believed was a failure. On the first day of substantive debate “May 30, 1787” the Framers decisively rejected a “federal” constitution in favor of a “national” one. This decision guided their deliberations for the rest of the Convention, only to be swept under the rug by the rhetorical strategy of the pro-ratification “Federalists.”

For the full text of these works and additional scholarship from UW Law faculty and staff, visit the  University of Wisconsin Law School Legal Studies Research Paper Series  on SSRN. A free email subscription is available at the top right of the page.

An official website of the United States government

Here’s how you know

The .gov means it’s official. Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

The site is secure. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

• Report Fraud
• Get Consumer Alerts
• Search the Legal Library
• Submit Public Comments

Take action

• Report an antitrust violation
• File adjudicative documents
• Find banned debt collectors
• View competition guidance
• Competition Matters Blog

New HSR thresholds and filing fees for 2024

View all Competition Matters Blog posts

We work to advance government policies that protect consumers and promote competition.

View Policy

Search or browse the Legal Library

Find legal resources and guidance to understand your business responsibilities and comply with the law.

Browse legal resources

• Find policy statements
• Submit a public comment

Vision and Priorities

Memo from Chair Lina M. Khan to commission staff and commissioners regarding the vision and priorities for the FTC.

Technology Blog

Consumer facing applications: a quote book from the tech summit on ai.

View all Technology Blog posts

Advice and Guidance

Learn more about your rights as a consumer and how to spot and avoid scams. Find the resources you need to understand how consumer protection law impacts your business.

• Report fraud
• Report identity theft
• Register for Do Not Call
• Sign up for consumer alerts
• Get Business Blog updates
• Get your free credit report
• Find refund cases
• Order bulk publications
• Consumer Advice
• Shopping and Donating
• Credit, Loans, and Debt
• Jobs and Making Money
• Unwanted Calls, Emails, and Texts
• Identity Theft and Online Security
• Business Guidance
• Advertising and Marketing
• Credit and Finance
• Privacy and Security
• By Industry
• For Small Businesses
• Browse Business Guidance Resources
• Business Blog

Servicemembers: Your tool for financial readiness

Visit militaryconsumer.gov

Get consumer protection basics, plain and simple

Visit consumer.gov

Learn how the FTC protects free enterprise and consumers

Visit Competition Counts

Looking for competition guidance?

• Competition Guidance

News and Events

Latest news, ftc finalizes changes to the health breach notification rule.

View News and Events

Upcoming Event

Older adults and fraud: what you need to know.

View more Events

Sign up for the latest news

Follow us on social media

-->   -->   -->   -->   -->  

Playing it Safe: Explore the FTC's Top Video Game Cases

Learn about the FTC's notable video game cases and what our agency is doing to keep the public safe.

Latest Data Visualization

FTC Refunds to Consumers

Explore refund statistics including where refunds were sent and the dollar amounts refunded with this visualization.

About the FTC

Our mission is protecting the public from deceptive or unfair business practices and from unfair methods of competition through law enforcement, advocacy, research, and education.

Learn more about the FTC

Meet the Chair

Lina M. Khan was sworn in as Chair of the Federal Trade Commission on June 15, 2021.

Chair Lina M. Khan

Looking for legal documents or records? Search the Legal Library instead.

• Cases and Proceedings
• Premerger Notification Program
• Merger Review
• Anticompetitive Practices
• Competition and Consumer Protection Guidance Documents
• Warning Letters
• Consumer Sentinel Network
• Criminal Liaison Unit
• FTC Refund Programs
• Notices of Penalty Offenses
• Advocacy and Research
• Advisory Opinions
• Cooperation Agreements
• Federal Register Notices
• Public Comments
• Policy Statements
• International
• Office of Technology Blog
• Military Consumer
• Consumer.gov
• Bulk Publications
• Data and Visualizations
• Stay Connected
• Commissioners and Staff
• Bureaus and Offices
• Budget and Strategy
• Office of Inspector General
• Careers at the FTC

FTC Announces Rule Banning Noncompetes

• Competition
• Office of Policy Planning
• Bureau of Competition

Today, the Federal Trade Commission issued a final rule to promote competition by banning noncompetes nationwide, protecting the fundamental freedom of workers to change jobs, increasing innovation, and fostering new business formation.

“Noncompete clauses keep wages low, suppress new ideas, and rob the American economy of dynamism, including from the more than 8,500 new startups that would be created a year once noncompetes are banned,” said FTC Chair Lina M. Khan. “The FTC’s final rule to ban noncompetes will ensure Americans have the freedom to pursue a new job, start a new business, or bring a new idea to market.”

The FTC estimates that the final rule banning noncompetes will lead to new business formation growing by 2.7% per year, resulting in more than 8,500 additional new businesses created each year. The final rule is expected to result in higher earnings for workers, with estimated earnings increasing for the average worker by an additional $524 per year, and it is expected to lower health care costs by up to $194 billion over the next decade. In addition, the final rule is expected to help drive innovation, leading to an estimated average increase of 17,000 to 29,000 more patents each year for the next 10 years under the final rule.

Noncompetes are a widespread and often exploitative practice imposing contractual conditions that prevent workers from taking a new job or starting a new business. Noncompetes often force workers to either stay in a job they want to leave or bear other significant harms and costs, such as being forced to switch to a lower-paying field, being forced to relocate, being forced to leave the workforce altogether, or being forced to defend against expensive litigation. An estimated 30 million workers—nearly one in five Americans—are subject to a noncompete.

Under the FTC’s new rule, existing noncompetes for the vast majority of workers will no longer be enforceable after the rule’s effective date. Existing noncompetes for senior executives - who represent less than 0.75% of workers - can remain in force under the FTC’s final rule, but employers are banned from entering into or attempting to enforce any new noncompetes, even if they involve senior executives. Employers will be required to provide notice to workers other than senior executives who are bound by an existing noncompete that they will not be enforcing any noncompetes against them.

In January 2023, the FTC issued a  proposed rule which was subject to a 90-day public comment period. The FTC received more than 26,000 comments on the proposed rule, with over 25,000 comments in support of the FTC’s proposed ban on noncompetes. The comments informed the FTC’s final rulemaking process, with the FTC carefully reviewing each comment and making changes to the proposed rule in response to the public’s feedback.

In the final rule, the Commission has determined that it is an unfair method of competition, and therefore a violation of Section 5 of the FTC Act, for employers to enter into noncompetes with workers and to enforce certain noncompetes.

The Commission found that noncompetes tend to negatively affect competitive conditions in labor markets by inhibiting efficient matching between workers and employers. The Commission also found that noncompetes tend to negatively affect competitive conditions in product and service markets, inhibiting new business formation and innovation. There is also evidence that noncompetes lead to increased market concentration and higher prices for consumers.

Alternatives to Noncompetes

The Commission found that employers have several alternatives to noncompetes that still enable firms to protect their investments without having to enforce a noncompete.

Trade secret laws and non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) both provide employers with well-established means to protect proprietary and other sensitive information. Researchers estimate that over 95% of workers with a noncompete already have an NDA.

The Commission also finds that instead of using noncompetes to lock in workers, employers that wish to retain employees can compete on the merits for the worker’s labor services by improving wages and working conditions.

Changes from the NPRM

Under the final rule, existing noncompetes for senior executives can remain in force. Employers, however, are prohibited from entering into or enforcing new noncompetes with senior executives. The final rule defines senior executives as workers earning more than $151,164 annually and who are in policy-making positions.

Additionally, the Commission has eliminated a provision in the proposed rule that would have required employers to legally modify existing noncompetes by formally rescinding them. That change will help to streamline compliance.

Instead, under the final rule, employers will simply have to provide notice to workers bound to an existing noncompete that the noncompete agreement will not be enforced against them in the future. To aid employers’ compliance with this requirement, the Commission has included model language in the final rule that employers can use to communicate to workers. 

The Commission vote to approve the issuance of the final rule was 3-2 with Commissioners Melissa Holyoak and Andrew N. Ferguson voting no. Commissioners Rebecca Kelly Slaughter , Alvaro Bedoya , Melissa Holyoak and Andrew N. Ferguson each issued separate statements. Chair Lina M. Khan will issue a separate statement.

The final rule will become effective 120 days after publication in the Federal Register.

Once the rule is effective, market participants can report information about a suspected violation of the rule to the Bureau of Competition by emailing  [email protected] . 

The Federal Trade Commission develops policy initiatives on issues that affect competition, consumers, and the U.S. economy. The FTC will never demand money, make threats, tell you to transfer money, or promise you a prize. Follow the  FTC on social media , read  consumer alerts  and the  business blog , and  sign up to get the latest FTC news and alerts .

Press Release Reference

Contact information, media contact.

Victoria Graham Office of Public Affairs 415-848-5121