Nomination Process for Early Career Researcher Award

For this year, the deadline for submissions has been extended to AoE November 17, 2025.

Each year, the ACM Special Interest Group on Computer Science Education (SIGCSE) selects recipients for its Early Career Researcher Award.

The ACM SIGCSE Early Career Researcher Award recognizes and encourage outstanding contributions to computing education research by individuals in the early stages of their academic careers. This award is designed to highlight innovative and impactful work that addresses critical challenges in computing education, fosters pedagogical advancements, or provides new theoretical and empirical insights into the field. It aims to celebrate and support emerging researchers whose work demonstrates exceptional promise and aligns with ACM’s mission to advance computing as a science and profession. This award was initiated in 2025.

Conflict of Interest

All nominations are subject to the SIGCSE Awards Conflict of Interest and Eligibility Policy

Nomination Process

• How will nominations be solicited?
  Nominations will be solicited from the SIGCSE community through the organization’s communication channels, primarily listserv communication (SIGCSE-ANNOUNCE, which is an opt-out list; SIGCSE-MEMBERS, which is an opt-in list), posts on the organization’s website, and social media channels.

• When must a nomination be submitted? The deadline for nominations is September 1st. Please notify the SIGCSE Vice Chair of your plans to submit a nomination by August 15th if possible or as soon as you decide to nominate. The Vice Chair can also answer questions you have with the nomination process.

• Eligibility criteria:
  This award is targeted at early career SIGCSE members who have made outstanding contributions to computing education research. The nominee must be a current SIGCSE member. For purposes of this award, we define “early career” to be those individuals within the first 7 years of their professional computing education career. Because work in computing education does not always begin at the traditionally recognized early stages of careers (i.e. completion of graduate school or start of full-time employment), the nomination should clearly indicate why the candidate is “early career”, which can be the traditional indicators or indicate the point at which the candidate started work in computing education.
  
  For those whose early career could be considered longer than 7 calendar years due to career disruption (pregnancy, major illness, caregiver responsibilities, or other disruptions), the nominator must address this in the nomination letter citing the circumstances of career disruption and why the nominee should still be considered in the stage of early career.
  
  The awards committee will determine if a nominee meets the definition of “Early Career”.

• What information is needed for a nomination? The name of the individual being nominated, the award they are being nominated for, a 1-2 page (maximum) description of why the nominee deserves the award, and 3-5 (strict) letters of support on behalf of the nominee. A single letter signed by multiple people is still a single letter. Letters of support should be sent by the nominator with the other materials above. All materials are necessary for the candidate to be considered. Applications not meeting these criteria will not be considered.

• Who can be nominated? Anyone except a SIGCSE Board member or a current Award Committee member can be nominated for a SIGCSE award. Note the immediate past SIGCSE Chair is an automatic member of the SIGCSE Board. Deceased persons cannot be nominated; however, an award may be presented posthumously if the recipient’s death occurs after the SIGCSE Board approves the award nomination. Nominees currently in the ACM sanctions database will be disqualified.

• Who can nominate? A nominator must be a SIGCSE member. SIGCSE Board members cannot nominate or endorse any candidates. Self nominations are not allowed.

• How do I submit a nomination? The Nominator prepares their nomination letter, collects all letters of support, and sends them via this Google Form by September 1st AoE. Note: For 2025, the deadline has been extended to November 17th AoE.

  • As a file upload is required, Google requires that the nominator has a Google account. If this is a barrier, email the SIGCSE Vice Chair (see bottom of this page).
  • If you are in a location that restricts access to Google Forms, email the SIGCSE Vice Chair (see bottom of this page).

Selection Process

• Who reviews the letters and makes the decision? The SIGCSE Board appoints an Early Career Researcher Award Committee that reviews the materials after the nomination deadline. Committee members who have submitted a nomination for one or more of the current set of nominees before their appointment to the committee will recuse themselves from the selection process.

• How do I find out the results? After the committee has selected the winners, they will be contacted by the SIGCSE Vice Chair and told that they have been selected to receive the award. The nominators will also be contacted.

• When are the winners recognized? The winners will be announced on the SIGCSE listserv, and on the SIGCSE.org web site. They will receive their award at any of the SIGCSE-sponsored conferences in the calendar year immediately following their selection based on the preference of the award winner.

How to make a strong nomination

• How many support letters are needed? A nomination must have 3-5 support letters (strict). A single letter signed by multiple people is still a single letter. Remember it is not the quantity (3, 4 or 5) that is most important - it is the content of the letters that is important. When selecting letter writers, make sure they add value to the nomination. You may want to consider a mix of letters from SIGCSE members, those notable in computing education, previous award winners (only if they know the candidate’s work), and/or those who are faculty adopters of the nominee’s work. If all the letter writers are notable SIGCSE members who are adopters, fewer letters will be needed.

• Get endorsements from those who are familiar with the nominee’s work. A letter is stronger if the letter writer knows the nominee or knows their work well. If such letters are from people early in their career or students, they may not have as much weight as a letter from those more prominent in computing. In that case, you should consider such letters as additional letters to supplement the nomination.

• Target letter writers for specific items. If a nominee is notable for several reasons, you may want to give each letter writer a specific topic to make sure they mention it, so at least one letter covers that topic.

• Letter writers should not all be from the same institution. The nominee should be known outside of their own institution and networks. Your nomination will be stronger if it includes letters from different institutions and other than the nominee’s institution. Remember you are trying to make the case that the nominee is known in the broader computing education community.

• Should you involve the nominee? It can be easier to nominate someone and collect data to show their impact if you can involve the nominee. They know better than anyone else what they have done and the impact of their work. You will have to make this choice. If you do not want to tell them, then consider other ways to get that information. Try talking to their colleagues and/or their department chair. You can encourage them to put more information about themselves on their web page such as a biography and CV. Tell them you were talking about their work to someone else and went to their web page and could not find specific information. For impacts on textbooks, consider contacting their publisher.

• When should you start the process? The deadline for SIGCSE awards is September 1 every year. It is best to start the process as early as possible. That will give you plenty of time to connect with letter writers, give your letter writers time to write a good letter, and give you time to collect impact data if you need to.

Additional Questions

For any additional questions or guidance send email to: vice-chair@sigcse.org.