SPD Student Awards

SPD Studentship Awards

Since the late 1970s, the Solar Physics Division of the American Astronomical Society has presented a number of awards annually to outstanding undergraduate and graduate students who are interested in pursuing a career in solar physics.The purpose of these awards is to acquaint promising students with the field of solar physics by allowing these students to participate actively in the annual SPD meeting (or joint summer meeting with the AGU/AAS, as appropriate).

Depending upon financial need, the awards comprise a fraction of travel and room and board for the duration of the meeting. The awardees are selected by the SPD Studentship Committee (currently Gordon Emslie, Matthias Rempel, and Lisa Upton). Awardees are recognized at the meeting. Applications for the award are solicited in early spring, approximately one month before the abstract deadline for the meeting. They should be submitted to the Chair of the Studentship Awards Committee:

Gordon Emslie
Western Kentucky University
Department of Physics and Astronomy
239 Wetherby
Bowling Green, KY 42101

An application consists of the following:

Student Level

Requirements

Undergraduate and First Year Graduate Students
  1. Name, university, address, major, education level, science grade point
  2. Summary of interests and future plans in solar physics
  3. One letter of endorsement from a supervising scientist, that includes an evaluation of the student's financial requirements for attending the meeting and the extent to which partial support from other sources is available. (Letters or e-mails may be sent separately to the above address.)

Advanced Graduate Students

In addition to the above three requirements:

  • Enclose an abstract and deliver either an oral or poster presentation at the meeting. Abstracts should also be sent through the usual channels.

 

Awardees will be notified sufficiently in advance of the abstract deadline for the meeting for them to make the necessary plans to attend. Awards are issued by the Treasurer of the Division

Student awardees are expected to attend the entire SPD meeting and to be present at a brief awards ceremony to be held during the meeting.

Studentship Award numbers for the past few years:

Year # of Awards
2019 5
2018 3
2017 6
2016 11
2015 9
2014 10
2013 10
2012 11
2011 10
2010 8
2009 8
2008 5
2007 10
2006 10
2005 6
2004 7
2003 14
2002 5
2001 6
2000 9
 

SPD Student Poster Award

Starting in 2008, the Solar Physics Division of the American Astronomical Society has presented an award (plus a number of honorable mentions) to the best student poster presented at the Division's annual meeting. A "student" is defined in this context as either:

  1. any individual who has not yet been awarded the PhD degree, or
  2. a recent (since January 1 of the year of the meeting) doctoral graduate whose work, as presented on their poster, was carried out wholly as part of earning that degree

The student must be the first author on the poster.

To be considered for the award, each interested student should indicate that they are a candidate on the abstract submission form and should place a "candidate" sticker (available at the meeting) on their poster. The award winner will be determined by the SPD Studentship Committee, based on input from an eminent set of jurists drawn from the solar physics community, based on criteria including:

  • quality of the poster presentation;
  • impact of the presented work on solar physics; and
  • clarity of the oral discussion by the student presenter.
Poster award winners in recent years:

Year Awardee Poster
2019 Ruizhu Chen
2018 Emily Irene Mason
2017 Paul Wright
2016 Shaheda Begum Shaik PDF
2015 Juan Camilo Buitrago-Casas PDF
2014 Stephen Pinkerton PDF
2013 Muzhou Lu
2012 Thomas A. Schad PDF
2011 Qingrong Chen HTML, PDF