SEM Student Competition

International Student Paper Presentation Competition

Sponsored by Correlated Solutions, Inc.
Held Every Year at the SEM Annual Conference and Exposition

Prizes

1st Place	$300 Cash Handbook on Experimental Mechanics (Hardbound), Second Edition  SEM Student Membership  Publication of paper in Experimental Techniques	2011 Student Paper Competition Winners: Aaron Albrecht, 3rd Place; Michael Zervas, 1st Place; Jefferson Wright, 2nd Place
2nd Place	$200 Cash Manual of Experimental Stress Analysis  SEM Student Membership  Publication of paper in Experimental Techniques
3rd Place	$100 Cash SEM Student Membership  Publication of paper in Experimental Techniques

The Student Paper Competitions were originated to encourage excellence in technical communication in the experimental mechanics field. A regional paper competition was initiated in 1984 in a joint effort by SEM's Milwaukee Local Section and SEM's Student Chapter of Michigan Technological University. Since that time, students from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, and Michigan Technological University have participated in the regional competition held each spring in Milwaukee at one of the regular local section meetings.

The first national competition was held during the 1991 SEM Spring Conference. The competition was sponsored by SEM's Milwaukee Local Section along with the Education and Local Sections Committees of SEM. Twelve students from nine different schools participated in the competition.  The SEM Education Foundation supplied Financial Sponsorship for the Competition in the mid 1990's through 2008.  In 2009, Correlated Solutions, Inc. became the Financial Sponsor of the competition.

If you are a full time student and are working on a project, thesis or dissertation that is at a point that some phase of it can be presented at the Annual Conference held in June, you are encouraged to enter.

If your paper is selected for the competition, you receive free conference registration and a ticket to the Awards Luncheon. Transportation, lodging and other expenses to attend the conference should be provided by you or your university.

In 2008 a Student Poster Session was developed since the response to the Student Competition Call for Papers was far larger than it had been in any of the 15 years since the Competition’s inception.  Only 16 entries can be accepted into the Competition, and since 2008, the total number of entries has been much higher than 16.  The Poster Session was developed for those students whose papers were judged to be of superior quality, but did not make the top 16.

For more information, click here.

Past Recipients are: