The Canadian Computer-Human Communications Society sponsors two annual dissertation awards: the Bill Buxton Award for an outstanding dissertation in the field of Human-Computer Interaction and the Alain Fournier Award for an outstanding dissertation in the field of Computer Graphics.
Nominators should determine which award (Bill Buxton Award or Alain Fournier Award) is appropriate before preparing a nomination. Information on each of the awards is available through the links above. A dissertation may only be nominated for one dissertation award and only for the single year in which the dissertation is eligible. Areas such as Visualization have significant overlap with both fields. Nominators are encouraged to choose the best fit for the dissertation. Dissertations will only be considered for the award identified in the nomination.
Award years are calendar years. Only dissertations successfully defended during that calendar year are eligible. The dissertation must be accepted in final form by the nominee’s university no later than February 15 following the award year. Dissertations that do not meet this requirement will be removed from consideration.
Nomination Process
Eligible candidates must:
- have defended a dissertation between January 1 and December 31 of the award year for a doctoral degree awarded by a Canadian University in the area of Human-Computer Interaction, or Computer Graphics,
- be nominated by a faculty member at a Canadian university.
There are two steps in the nomination process.
Pre-nominations must include the award for which the nomination is being made (Bill Buxton Award or Alain Fournier Award), the candidate’s name and institution, an abstract of the dissertation, and the name(s) and affiliation(s) of the supervisor(s). The abstract can be a working abstract for dissertations that are still in progress. Pre-nominations must be submitted by email to Dr. Pierre Poulin (poulin@iro.umontreal.ca) no later than December 1 of the award year. Pre-nominations are mandatory in order to streamline the jury selection and evaluation process.
Nominations must include the following package of three documents (all in PDF format):
- a letter of nomination from a faculty member at a Canadian university summarizing the research contributions reported in the dissertation and providing evidence for why the dissertation is worthy of an outstanding dissertation award,
- a resume/CV for the nominee, including a complete list of publications, and
- a copy or a link to a copy of the nominee’s doctoral dissertation.
No other documents will be considered (do not submit papers or other reference letters).
Selection Process
The Canadian Computer-Human Communications Society is committed to equity, diversity, and inclusivity. In the context of our Dissertation Awards, we encourage nominations for dissertations from women, non-binary genders, and people with non-traditional sexual orientations, as well as from members of diverse cultural communities.
The selection committee will evaluate each nomination based on the following selection criteria: the quality of the innovations in the research, the presentation of the results in the dissertation, and the overall contributions by the nominee to the field of Human-Computer Interaction (for the Bill Buxton Award) or Computer Graphics (for the Alain Fournier Award).
The nomination letter should address the selection criteria and, if appropriate, the relationship between the research reported in the dissertation with other publications listed in the CV when there is an overlap.
A faculty member may nominate more than one candidate. Questions about eligibility, the awards, or the evaluation process should be addressed to Dr. Pierre Poulin. A nominee may be of any nationality, but must have completed all of the degree requirements for a doctorate from a Canadian university by February 15 following the award year.
Jury Members for each award are drawn from the research community. Normally jurors will not be actively associated with any of the nominees or nominees’ institutions or supervisors for the award year in which they serve. Faculty who submit nominations should expect to serve as a juror at some point.