OSA and Corning co-sponsor new student award

WASHINGTON, DC AND CORNING, NY-The Optical Society of America Foundation (www.osa-foundation.org) and Corning Incorporated (Corning, NY) announced the establishment of a new student award competition. Created to recognize future leaders in the field of optical communications and made possible through an endowment from Corning, the Corning Outstanding Student Paper Award Competition will debut at the Optical Fiber Communication Conference and Exposition/National Fiber Optic Engineers Conference (OFC/NFOEC) in 2008.

“The work students are doing today will serve as the backbone for future technologies and solutions to some of the pressing concerns in optical communications,” says Eric S. Musser, general manager and vice president, optical fiber, Corning Incorporated. “The establishment of this award creates a way to highlight innovative student research. Working with the OSA Foundation, we will be able to help connect tomorrow’s promising minds with today’s industry leaders at OFC/NFOEC.”

The Corning/OSA Foundation award will recognize student papers based on innovation, research excellence, and presentation skills. Students will be able to opt into the competition as part of the regular submission process for OFC/NFOEC 2008. Papers submitted to the competition will be reviewed and scored by the OFC/NFOEC Technical Program Committee according to standard review criteria. The 10 to 12 papers receiving the highest scores will be considered finalists for the onsite component.

Finalists will be asked to submit supplemental information approximately one month prior to the conference. These additional requirements will include the lead author’s curriculum vitae, two letters of reference, as well as formal proof of student status. These materials, coupled with a review of the finalists’ presentation at the meeting, will be used to select the grand-prize winner and the two honorable mention recipients.

Final evaluations and the selection of the winners will be made by the OFC/NFOEC General and Program Chairs. The grand-prize recipient will receive $1,500; papers of honorable mention will receive $1,000 each. The awards will be presented during the Post-Deadline Paper Session at OFC/NFOEC 2008.

More information on the award will be detailed in the OFC/NFOEC 2008 “Call for Papers” announcement that will be available in June 2007. For additional details on this program, please visit www.ofcnfoec.org.