Student Paper Award:

• First Prize: $1,000 • Second Prize: $500 • Third Prize: $300

The TPRC is an annual forum for dialogue among scholars and decision-makers from the public and private sectors engaged in communication and information policy. The purpose of the conference is to acquaint policymakers with the best of recent research and to familiarize researchers with the knowledge needs of policymakers and the industry. The TPRC offers the Student Paper Award to support and encourage excellence in telecommunications research and writing at the graduate level. All aspects of communication, information, and Internet policy are eligible for the award.

The result of the competition will be notified to all participants by June 15, 2008. Award recipients will be invited to attend and present their papers at the TPRC to be held on September 26-28, 2008, at the George Mason University Law School, Arlington, Virginia. Award recipients (one per paper) will be exempt from the conference registration fee, receive free meals at the conference, two nights’ lodging at the conference hotel, and up to $500 towards travel costs.

This year we are particularly interested in papers addressing the following themes:

1. Network Competition, Policy and Management
2. Next Generation and all-IP Networks: Policy, Regulatory, Architectural and Societal Issues
3. Spectrum Management and Wireless Futures: Anywhere, Anytime Communications and its Implications
4. Societal Issues: Universality and Affordable Access; ICTs for Development and Growth
5. The Transformation and Future of Media in an Age of User- and Community-Produced Creativity
6. The Transformation and Future of Intellectual Property and Digital Rights
7. Privacy, Security, Identity and Trust
8. Internet Governance and Institutional Strategies for Information Policy
9. Other Emerging Topics

The competition is open to all persons who were graduate or law students on October 1, 2007. Thus, first-year faculty members, industry, and government professionals may be eligible. Papers may be based on research undertaken for a Master’s thesis, a Ph.D. dissertation, or other supervised analytical writing. Papers with multiple student authors all meeting these requirements are also eligible.

Students also are encouraged to submit abstracts and poster session proposals (see the respective calls). Papers that are co-authored with a faculty member are not eligible for the Student Paper Award but may be submitted as regular conference papers. Faculty co-authors may not be added after a Student Paper Award has been granted. Students wishing to participate in this competition should submit a nomination letter from their faculty advisor. The letter should include the name of the student, the program of study followed, and a short description of the paper. The letter should be sent by e-mail to Johannes M. Bauer (bauerj@msu.edu) and Björn Wellenius (wellenius@attglobal.net).

All papers and nominating letters are due by May 2, 2008. No papers will be accepted after this date. The papers should be double-spaced and no longer than 30 pages. Papers must be submitted via the TPRC web site (http://www.tprc.org).  Please see the guidelines for authors for additional information.

Please address inquiries to Johannes M. Bauer (bauerj@msu.edu) or Björn Wellenius (wellenius@attglobal.net).