Review Process, criteria, & decision

All submitted nominations will be reviewed by the Award Committee. The names of all nominees will be publicly posted on the APECS mentor award website and APECS News after the nomination deadline and will be available until the Award Committee has made its selection.

The Award Committee will assess each mentor in each category between 0 and 3 points. The maximum total number of points is 24 (across 8 categories). Points are assigned in the following categories:

1. Time commitment and availability
   • Evaluate the time commitment of the mentor to mentoring (discussion of research, motivating, career guiding, discussions etc.) and their availability to mentees.
2. Additional opportunities
   • List examples of particular mentoring activities/endeavors (field work, conferences, meetings, leadership opportunities, community interactions), and provide information about the length of your collaboration and particular benefits to ECRs.
3. Originality of support/mentoring
   • Describe, in detail, why you consider the mentor’s commitment and approach to mentoring as original. Try to share specific examples of actions undertaken by the mentor.
4. Career guiding and support
   • Describe, in detail, how the mentor’s support aided in ECRs career development. Preferably, use the examples of particular development/career possibilities brought by the mentor.
5. Helping ECRs with networking
   • Provide examples how the mentor helped ECRs to become more engaged in the polar research community, or other communities. List the networking possibilities provided by the mentor. Describe how the mentor has helped to strengthen the connections among ECRs in polar research.
6. Variety of mentees the mentor has supported
   • Describe the community around the mentor, focusing on the inclusivity of the community to accept new members, as well as the career path and the stage of other mentees (i.e., undergraduates, graduates, post-docs, engineers, lab technicians and others).
7. APECS involvement
   • List specific examples of the mentor’s involvement in the APECS community, either as an APECS member or as a mentor of other members and national committees.
8. Additional information
   • Provide information on the mentor’s activities that you consider important to the overall assessment that do not fall within any of the above categories (including their participation in mentor panels, workshops, webinars etc.).

In order to fully recognize mentors' participation in early career research and APECS activities, one prize will be awarded. The award winner will be publicly announced on the APECS website and via the other APECS communication channels (mailing list and social media).