Research Award to encourage Graduate Students

[kerprof]

I am currently mentoring 5 PhD students and 2 MS Thesis research students in my research group.

To encourage students in research activities, I am thinking about instituting research award mechanism based on the following criteria for the activities from January 1 to December 31 of the calendar year, with the activity report due by end of December.

1. Number of Journal /Conference Proceeding Submissions (Low Weightage)
2. Number of Journal /Conference Proceeding Acceptances (High Weightage)
3. At least one Satisfactory Research Presentation per semester during the lab meetings

The conference can be any  of the Top 300 conference proceedings in my field.  But it should be published by one of the
following: AAAI, ACL, ACM, AMIA, AIS, IEEE, IJCAI, NIPS, PMLR, SIAM, SPIE, SPRINGER and USENIX. The journal can be any of the Top 1000 journals in my field. But the publisher should be one of the following: AAAI, ACM, AIS, IEEE, Elsevier, Springer, IET, JMIR, JAIR, IOS, SIAM, SPIE, Taylor and Francis, WILEY, and SAGE. The rankings for these top conferences and journals are clearly tracked and accessed using web page (For Journal - https://research.com/journals-rankings/computer-science/2021  and for Conferences - https://research.com/conference-rankings/computer-science/2021 )

While I am planning to award top 3 graduate students with say $200, $100 and $50, I will also nominate  the top ranked student (student with the highest score) for the annual university level  graduate student research award.

While I still need to iron out the rubric, please advise if this is in a right direction. If so, please suggest your thoughts on modifying the criteria (for eg., first author submissions/acceptances are scored higher compared to non-first author submissions/acceptances, modifying scoring according to the rank category of the journal /conference... for example submission/acceptance in the journal ranked 1 to 100 will be scored higher compared to submission/acceptance in journal ranked 400 to 500. I am not sure if their help towards submitting the external research grant can be added to the criteria as well.) 

[Ruralguy]

What problem are you trying to address?

Also, make sure it doesn't run afoul of colleges ethics guidelines (I don't think out of pocket awards decided by one person are a good idea).

[kerprof]

What problem are you trying to address?

Also, make sure it doesn't run afoul of colleges ethics guidelines (I don't think out of pocket awards decided by one person are a good idea).

At least couple of students requested me to nominate them for the university level annual graduate student award. The nominations are due mid January on an annual basis.

If not cash award, I can at least use this criteria to nominate the student for university level annual graduate student award.

In regards to cash, I am thinking of paying by adding these award amount to the stipend rather than I pay from my pocket.

[Puget]

What problem are you trying to address?

Also, make sure it doesn't run afoul of colleges ethics guidelines (I don't think out of pocket awards decided by one person are a good idea).

At least couple of students requested me to nominate them for the university level annual graduate student award. The nominations are due mid January on an annual basis.

If not cash award, I can at least use this criteria to nominate the student for university level annual graduate student award.

In regards to cash, I am thinking of paying by adding these award amount to the stipend rather than I pay from my pocket.

I would be very surprised if you are allowed to do this. Most places the grad stipends are a set amount-- you can't just pay some students more.

Think about the lab culture that you want-- do you really want your students to be competing rather than collaborating?
Several of us have said before that basing evaluations on acceptances is a very bad idea because so much is out of the students' control. Honestly, you keep proposing many similar bad ideas and don't seem to be listening to the feedback you are getting here.

[Cheerful]

While I am planning to award top 3 graduate students with say $200, $100 and $50,

$50? Not sure what to say about that.  Better than nothing, I suppose.

[Ruralguy]

I don't think it's a bad idea,it just needs revision. I'd mKe it departmental and set up a fund to establish the award. I'd make it a bit higher though, and maybe a college store gift certificate rather than cash.

[Parasaurolophus]

I don't think it's a bad idea,it just needs revision. I'd mKe it departmental and set up a fund to establish the award. I'd make it a bit higher though, and maybe a college store gift certificate rather than cash.

I think that's right. Otherwise, you're liable to run afoul of departmental and college guidelines, to say nothing of the potential ethics issues.

[Hegemony]

In my experience, the students are either organized and ambitious, or they're not. We already have several awards like this for various accomplishments. Despite our urging, the students basically ignore them. The amount of money ($100-500) is not high enough to make it worth their while to alter their mode of working, and they are generally so overwhelmed that they just don't have time to consider another thing. This last semester we had a $1000 award that only required a one-page summary of the student's regular research project, and we couldn't get any of them to bother to summarize their project for the award. When I spoke to them, several of them acknowledged that they would have liked the money, but they're too focused on the papers and classes and assignments and prospectuses and all to add one more consideration to their plate.

[Puget]

I don't think it's a bad idea,it just needs revision. I'd mKe it departmental and set up a fund to establish the award. I'd make it a bit higher though, and maybe a college store gift certificate rather than cash.

That's a pretty major revision! Sure, departmental research prizes are a good idea (and pretty standard in most programs), but that's not at all what kerprof was proposing here.

[Ruralguy]

Sounds like maybe , Hegemony, you can change what they need to submit for the award. Have it be online form only, abstract from the paper, and only have them write something new if they are, say, chosen to be 1 of 10 finalists. Even then, just make it a paragraph.

[Ruralguy]

Well, I was just trying to get the conversation away from labels of "bad" and "good."
Yes, of course I know its significantly different, but I was attempting diplomacy.

[Puget]

Well, I was just trying to get the conversation away from labels of "bad" and "good."
Yes, of course I know its significantly different, but I was attempting diplomacy.

And that's kind and all, but I think Kerprof needs blunt and direct advice at this point, given recurrent patterns on these threads.

[Ruralguy]

Well, yes, of course, some of the ideas probably wouldn't work because I don't know any work place that would allow a supervisor to (in an official way) supplement a worker's income with out of the pocket cash. Ok, probably it might work at some small businesses or a shady business. But not at any college or university. So, yes, those parts of the proposal aren't so great. But rewarding productivity is generally a good idea, just has to be done in ways that (a) are legal and ethical (b) actually create the intended incentive.

[kerprof]

Well, yes, of course, some of the ideas probably wouldn't work because I don't know any work place that would allow a supervisor to (in an official way) supplement a worker's income with out of the pocket cash. Ok, probably it might work at some small businesses or a shady business. But not at any college or university. So, yes, those parts of the proposal aren't so great. But rewarding productivity is generally a good idea, just has to be done in ways that (a) are legal and ethical (b) actually create the intended incentive.

Maybe I should drop the idea of cash award and just use it towards nomination for university level graduate student award. However, the criteria needs to be revised.

[doc700]

Hello kerprof.  I am in the STEM fields and also run a research group that is about your size.  I work at an R1 and generally my students are quite competent and motivated.  That said, none of them could get a project from the start to a paper/conference proceeding without significant mentoring at first. 

I have a general group meeting but I also have subgroup meetings weekly (1-a few students working on a project).  At the subgroup meetings we review what the students did in the past week and the students present their goals for the upcoming week.  I take notes while they are suggesting goals.  At the next meeting we then review their prior week goals in context to what happened.  Of course some weeks we accomplish none of the stated goals as some piece of equipment broke and attention was diverted.  But I think the process of articulating what they hope to accomplish and then coming back next week keeps people fairly focused.  It also helps when we have 2 students working together for each to articulate their priorities and to discuss with each other. We also meet 1-on-1 at the end of the year to have big goals for the upcoming year (conferences they might want to attend, quals, other skills they want to develop etc).

When the students want to work on a paper, we do it in steps.  First we discuss the big picture of the paper.  Then they prepare the 4 main figures and we discuss through those.  Then they write the captions for the figures etc to get a paper.  I do have a senior student who can now produce a standard paper fairly independently but even that student needed a framework at the start.

With my group, presenting at a conference itself is a reward.  Especially with some things hinting at being in person, the students really enjoy having results to share, traveling to a location etc.  They have also really enjoyed seeing their work in print.  I have nominated students for awards etc but that isn't the largest motivation (one should do science for the joy of discovery not to win an award).  My students didn't need motivation but they did need structure in the research process.