For Prize Selection Committees
Guidelines for Prize Committees
Guidelines for Conflict of Interest for Prize Selection Committees
SIAM Prize Portal User Instructions [PDF, 1MB]
Guidelines for Prize Committees
SIAM Prizes are established to highlight the best work in our community. They are intended to recognize individual achievement and to showcase the work of our community to the outside world.
Various SIAM Prizes have been established each with a different purpose or demographic---for senior researchers (lifetime achievement), for mid-career researchers, early career researchers or students.
The following guidelines augment, but do not supersede, existing prize specifications.
- Committees should pay careful attention to written nomination packages. Individuals have made considerable effort to generate a nomination package.
- Committees should consider carefully the purpose and intent of the prize, and measure the nominations against the purpose listed in the prize specifications. The selection committee should take care to not simply choose from names of nominees known to the committee members.
- Competing nominations must be well documented. A copy of any nomination package received by the chair or another member of the committee should be forwarded to the prize administrators at the SIAM office. The SIAM office will disseminate all packages and archive the nominations for an appropriate period of time.
- The prize committee is encouraged to help promote the prize and advertise the open call for nominations. Any nomination must be submitted along with appropriate documentation to the SIAM office. This does not mean that prize committee members may make nominations; prize selection committee members must abide by the Conflict of Interest guidelines.
- A committee may conclude that no prize should be awarded if it feels that there is no nomination of sufficiently high quality.
- SIAM is working over the next three years or so towards imposing lower bounds on the number of nominations that must be received in order for a prize to be awarded and strongly encourages prize committees to ensure receipt of a sufficient number of nominations representing the best of the field. A rough guide is 6 nominations for major prizes and 3 for SIAG prizes.
- Discussions should be open to all selection committee members. Any discussions of prize nominations/selections should preferably be at a meeting set in advance (most likely a teleconference) with all invited to participate, or by email with everyone on the committee included. Exceptions can be made for conflicts of interest [see here].
- Previous nominations will roll over for one cycle when it makes sense to do so. For example, it makes sense to roll over a nomination for a lifetime achievement award but not for a best dissertation prize (since there is a small window of eligibility in the latter case). This is a SIAM policy decision and not the decision of the selection committee or its chair. The SIAM office will include the rolled-over nominations in the packages of nominations that it distributes to the committee.
- The membership of the prize committee will be made public at the time of the announcement of the call for nominations. Members of the prize committee are not eligible for nomination or allowed to submit nominations.
Guidelines for Conflict of Interest for Prize Selection Committees
The following is intended as a set of guidelines for members and chairs of prize committees who are charged to select a prize recipient from among a set of nominations.
A selection committee should avoid favoritism or the appearance of favoritism. Each member of a prize selection committee will be sent a list of nominees, and the committee member will be asked to read the following prize guidelines and to certify via email whether or not a conflict exists with one of more of the nominees.
Members may be asked to recuse themselves from certain discussions or to step down from the committee if their participation creates a conflict of interest or might create an appearance of a conflict of interest.
Conflicts of interest, or the appearance of such conflicts, would most likely arise if one or more of the following conditions hold:
- The body of work (paper, significant piece of research, or the like) considered in the prize nomination was done by someone while a student or postdoc of the committee member.
- The person nominated is a current or former student or current or recent (within 5 years) postdoc of the committee member; or, conversely, the person nominated is or has been a thesis advisor or postgraduate-scholar sponsor of the committee member.
- The research being judged is in any way a collaborative effort between the committee member and the nominee.
- The committee member has a close personal or family relationship with a nominee (for example: close friend, (domestic) partner, ex-(domestic) partner).
- The committee member is currently at the same institution as one of the nominees or is a recent (within five years), current, or (known to be) future department colleague of a nominee.
- The committee member is a major co-author with a nominee on a paper published within the past three years or the committee member has been a co-investigator with a nominee on a large research grant in the last three years.
- The committee member has financial ties via a direct chain of command and/or participation in tenure, promotion, salary or forms of support by either party.
No list can cover all circumstances. Selection Committee chairs and individual members need to consider the spirit of these guidelines and report anything that might appear to be a conflict of interest.
The existence of a conflict should be reported to [email protected]. If there is a question about whether or not there is a conflict, report the potential conflict and the circumstances. The SIAM President (Major Awards) or VP at Large (Activity Group Prizes) will make the appropriate judgment on whether a true conflict of interest exists and make a determination about the severity of the conflict or its appearance.
If there does appear to be a conflict, the committee member may be asked to step down from the selection committee. In less severe cases, the committee member may be asked to refrain from participating in any committee discussions until the conflicting nomination is no longer under consideration.
It will be up to the President (Major Awards) and VP at Large (Activity Group Prizes) to decide whether to make new appointments to the prize selection committee should a committee member be required to step down. In no case should the prize selection committee be composed of fewer than 3 deliberating members.
Approved by the SIAM Major Awards Committee and by the SIAM Council, July 2017
Procedures and Roles
The Role of Selection Committee Chair
- The chair sets the rules, reminds members of their obligations, takes the votes. The chair is also a voting member of the selection committee.
- The chair ensures that confidentiality is maintained in order to facilitate a free and open discussion.
- The voting procedures are left to the discretion of the chair.
- The chair ensures that conflict of interest rules are followed [see above].
- The chair is responsible for providing a short report on the committee's deliberations that justifies the recommendation, as well as the citation and any other information needed for the certificate. This task can be delegated by the chair to another member, but the chair retains responsibility. These will be forwarded to the officers approving the recommendation.
- The chair keeps the SIAM office informed.
Role of Committee Members
- Committee members should share all information with the other committee members. It is the responsibility of each committee member to inform chair of any potential conflict of interest.
- Each committee member is responsible for providing a fair and informed vote. This requires the member to read the nomination packages assigned by the chair.
Role of SIAM Office
The SIAM HQ is generally responsible for administration procedures related to prizes. It will
- Promote the call for nominations.
- Maintain a prize calendar and ensure that calls for nomination, and formation and charging of prize committees is carried out in a timely manner.
- Open the call for nominations in late spring and publicize it with a poster inserted in SIAM News.
- Send a call for nominations out to other organizations (e.g., NA-Digest, AMS) as appropriate.
- Set the dates in consultation with the chair.
- Collect nominations.
- Make nomination packages available to committee.
- Collect the decision package from the committee chair (including justification) and forward it to the appropriate individual/body for approval.
- Inform the winner and arrange for the lecture, if there is a lecture associated with the prize.
- Arrange that any medals, certificates, or plaques (as appropriate for a given prize) are created.
- Prepare the prize brochure, press releases, and announcements for public dissemination.
Rules for Multiple Winners
RESOLVED, that the SIAM Board of Trustees approves as presented the guidelines for multiple prize winners as recommended by the SIAM Major Awards Committee, said guidelines reading:
SIAM encourages all recipients of SIAM Prizes to attend the meetings at which their prizes will be awarded. When multiple winners are chosen for a single SIAM prize, the monetary award will be divided equally among the recipients. Reimbursement of travel expenses to attend the award ceremony will normally be limited to a maximum of $1,500 for any one prize. Meeting registration for award recipients at the SIAM meeting where the award is presented will be waived.
