DISTINGUISHED DISSERTATIONS 2003 – DEADLINE APRIL 1st
2003
Final announcement – including submission
instructions
Closing date for this years competition is 1 April 2003
The Conference of
Professors and Heads of Computing (CPHC), in
conjunction with the British
Computer Society (BCS), annually selects
for publication the best British
PhD/DPhil dissertations in computer
science. Over thirty theses have been
selected for publication since the
scheme began in 1990.
The scheme
aims to make more visible the significant contribution made
by
Britain - in
particular by post-graduate students - to computer science.
Publication
also serves to provide a model for future students. The
selection panel on
behalf of CPHC consists of up to nine experienced
computer scientists, not
more than one from any institution, each
normally serving on the panel for
three years. The 2002/2003 panel
membership includes Steve Benford
(Nottingham, Chairman), Gordon
Blair
(Lancaster), Muffy Calder
(Glasgow), Jon Crowcroft
(Cambridge), David De
Roure
(Southampton), Peter Dew (Leeds),
Peter Johnson (Bath),
Ursula
Martin (St Andrews), and Nigel Shadbolt
(Southampton).
Any dissertation is eligible which
is submitted for a doctorate in the
British Isles in
what is commonly understood as Computer Science.
(Theses which are basically
in some other discipline but which make use,
even very extensive use, of
computing will not be regarded as eligible.)
To be considered, a
dissertation should: make a noteworthy contribution
to the subject, reach a
high standard of exposition, place its results
clearly in the context of
computer science as a whole, and enable a
computer scientist with
significantly different interests to grasp its
essentials.
It is
reasonable to submit a thesis to the scheme if it has all of the
above
qualities in good measure, and if it is comparable in standard
with the top
10-15% of dissertations in the subject. Long dissertations
are not
encouraged; if the main text is more than about 80,000 words,
there should be
good justification.
We are introducing a number of changes to the
competition for 2003:
- electronic submission of theses
-
electronic publication of theses by the BCS/CPHC
- publication of a
greater number of theses. Last year's panel felt that
many of the
short-listed theses were a credit to our research community
and deserved
wider visibility. As a result, we intend to publish
short-listed theses and
then, within these, to star the competition winners.
The aim of these
changes is to increase the availability of the selected
theses, to enable a
larger number of theses to be made available, and to
simplify the submission
and subsequent processing of theses.
The dissertation should be submitted
electronically by the author's
examiners, or by the Head of Department with
the examiner's advice. It
should be accompanied by the author's written
agreement and by an
assurance that within the previous twelve months the
examiners have
recommended to the author's institution that it merits a
doctorate. An
indication should be given if the dissertation is being
considered for
publication elsewhere. The dissertation should be accompanied
by a
written justification, of perhaps 300 words, by one of the examiners
-
preferably the external - explaining the dissertation's claim
to
distinction.
The latest submission date is 1st April 2003.
To submit a dissertation please:
Email to Steve Benford:
[log in to unmask]
-
a pdf file containing the thesis as an attachment or a link to
where the file can be downloaded from the web
-
a covering note explaining that this is a submission to this
year’s competition
-
copies of external examiners reports for the thesis and/or
external examiners recommendation that the thesis be submitted to the
competition
-
a letter of recommendation from the candidate’s supervisor
Please ensure that the subject line of the email contains the
phrase:
‘Distinguished Dissertations 2003’
I will email you a notification of receipt of the thesis.
Please contact me if you do not receive this.
Please contact me directly in case of any queries and/or
difficulties.
Steve Benford, March 2003.