Statistics Canada Research Prizes and Award for Excellence in Educational Research using Statistics Canada Data Bases

Open to all students enrolled in a graduate degree program in education

Statistics Canada, under the auspices of the Canadian Society for the Study of Education (CSSE) and the Canadian Educational Researchers' Association (CERA), is offering

1. Research Prizes
2. Award of Excellence in Educational Research involving the use of Statistics Canada data.

There will be up to five Research Prizes per year based on research proposals, and one Award for Excellence in Educational Research based on an article suitable for presentation at the Annual Meeting of CSSE.

The Objectives of these awards are

-	To encourage research and analysis by graduate students using the education data collected by Statistics Canada;
-	To recognize excellence in research through awards and publication of the results;
-	To raise awareness and use of the Statistics Canada data sources that can support statistical research.

Winners

• 2002 - Lexie Code, Memorial University of Newfoundland, under the supervision of Prof. Dennis Treslan
• 2000 - Jim Montgomery, Malaspina University College
• 1997 - Elizabeth Quinlan, OISE/University of Toronto

Further information

• Research prizes
• The award of excellence

• How will the process work?

  • Development and review of research proposals
  • Selection of the winning paper and presentation of the award
• For further information
• Poster

Research prizes

• Statistics Canada will provide statistical data and/or services to support up to five research proposals per year to a maximum value of $2,000 each. For major Statistics Canada data sources please refer to the publications on Guide to data on elementary and secondary education in Canada (81F0004GIB) and Guide to Statistics Canada information and data sources on adult education and training (81-580-XIB). Students may also submit proposals on other research topics, which draw extensively on Statistics Canada data.

The award of excellence

The winning student who produces the best qualifying paper will receive:

• a prize from Statistics Canada of $500
• a Certificate of Excellence, normally to be presented at the Annual CSSE Conference
• free membership for one year in CSSE and CERA
• free registration at one annual conference of CSSE, and an opportunity to present their paper at the conference in a Statistics Canada session sponsored by CERA

Development and review of research proposals

• Students will draft a proposal of no more than two single-spaced, printed pages, based on the published list of research topics. Students may also submit a proposal on a topic of their own choice that relates to education and uses Statistics Canada data sources. This proposal should provide information on research objectives, including principal questions to be addressed; educational significance of the problem; theoretical framework and statistical models or techniques to be employed; and data sources including specific data required from Statistics Canada.
• The student proposal must be endorsed by a faculty advisor, who should indicate that faculty guidance support will be available for the subsequent data analysis.
• All proposals must be submitted, in electronic form, by April 1st, September 1st or January 1st to the President of CERA, who would electronically convene a Review Committee consisting of CSSE members and Statistics Canada officials. Normally, a response will be provided within fifteen working days of the cut-off date. All applicants will then be sent a list of the proposals which have been funded. However, applications will be accepted at any time, with funding made available as of the next cut-off date.
• Where data are not already available at the student's university as part of the Data Liberation Initiative, Statistics Canada would provide statistical data and/or services (such as custom tabulations) to a maximum of $2,000 per proposal accepted. Statistics Canada would service this data request as quickly as possible, generally within 2-4 weeks, depending on complexity. Alternatively, the student could come to Statistics Canada to use the required data files. The student also has the right to ask questions of a specialist in the selected data files from Statistics Canada.

Selection of the winning paper and presentation of the award

Selection of the winning paper

• Students will submit their finished paper to the chair of the Statistics Canada Awards Committee, normally the president of CERA, by January 15th of each year. Names of the winners must be finalized by the Committee by March, in order to be listed in the final conference program.
• Award winners will be selected by a committee consisting of CSSE and CERA members plus at least one Statistics Canada representative.
• Submissions and papers in either official language are encouraged and will be reviewed in their language.
• To be eligible for the award, research papers must be submitted in a form that meets the publication standards for professional educational research journals. Specific evaluation procedures will be established by the CSSE.
• There may not be a winner in a given year, depending on the quality of submissions received.

Presentation of the award

• There would be a designated Statistics Canada research session at the annual CSSE conference, chaired by a CERA member of the Awards Committee. This session would begin with a presentation of results by the winning student, and possibly listing of runner-up candidates, followed by a description of new Statistics Canada surveys and data sources, and a discussion of possible research topics.

For further information contact:

Victor Glickman, Director, Edudata Canada, President, CERA, victor.glickman@ubc.ca, (604) 862-2522

Kathryn McMullen, Culture, Tourism and the Centre for Education Statistics Division, Statistics Canada, Kathryn.McMullen@statcan.ca, (613) 951-4570

Joel Yan, Co-ordinator of the University Liaison Program at Statistics Canada, ulp@statcan.ca, (613) 951-2858 or 1-800-465-1222