CALL FOR NOMINATIONS: 2017 SIGKDD Doctoral Dissertation Award
Nomination Deadline: April 30, 2017

2017 SIGKDD Dissertation Award nominations are open. ACM SIGKDD dissertation awards recognize outstanding work done by graduate students in the areas of data science, machine learning and data mining.

This annual award by ACM SIGKDD will recognize excellent research by doctoral candidates in the field of data science, data mining and knowledge discovery. The KDD Doctoral Dissertation Award winner and up to two runners-up will be recognized at the KDD conference, and their dissertations will have the opportunity to be published on the KDD Web site (http://www.kdd.org). The award winner will receive a plaque, a check for $2,500. The award winner will also receive a free registration to attend the KDD conference. The runners-up will receive a plaque at the conference. The winner and runners-up will be invited to present His or her work in a special session at the KDD conference.


Eligibility
The final dissertation defense should take place at the nominee’s host institution before the submission deadline. Furthermore, the final dissertation defense must not have taken place prior to January 1st, 2016. Nominations are limited to one doctoral dissertation per department or academic unit. Submissions must be received by the submission deadline.

Each nominated dissertation must also have been successfully defended by the candidate, and the final version of each nominated dissertation must have been accepted by the candidate’s academic unit. An English version of the dissertation must be submitted with the nomination. A dissertation can be nominated for both the SIGKDD Doctoral Dissertation Award and the ACM Doctoral Dissertation Award.


Important Dates
* Submission Deadline: April 30, 2017.
* Notification of Awards: June 30, 2017.
* Award Presentation at KDD 2017: August 13-17, 2017, Halifax, Nova Scotia - Canada.


Submission Procedure
* All nomination materials must be submitted electronically to: kdd-dda@cs.uic.edu

* Please use “SIGKDD DDA Nomination” in your subject line.

* All nomination materials must be in English. PDF format is preferred for all materials. Late submissions will not be accepted. A nomination must include:

* A nomination letter, written by the dissertation advisor of the candidate. This letter must include full contact information for both the advisor and the nominee as well as a one- or two-page summary of the significance of the dissertation.

* An endorsement letter signed by the department head.

* One PDF copy of the doctoral dissertation.

* A copyright transfer form signed by the candidate is required giving permission for the dissertation to appear on KDD.org Web site if the dissertation is selected as an award recipient (but if the nomination is also being submitted for the ACM Doctoral Dissertation Award, only one form needs to be signed). See: https://www.acm.org/binaries/content/assets/publications/copyreleaseproc-8-16.pdf
Optionally, the nomination may include up to two supporting letters from other individuals, discussing the significance of the dissertation.


Additional information is available at: http://www.kdd.org/awards/sigkdd-dissertation-award. Please direct questions to the Award Committee Chair: Tanya Berger-Wolf at kdd-dda@cs.uic.edu