News from SCB Committees
Education and Student Affairs committee
Activities for the coming year
Mentoring student abstracts
This year will be the third year that we will have provided abstract mentoring for ESL students at the
International Congress of Conservation Biology. The scheme has been a success, with very positive
feedback from both mentors and mentees.
Student oral and poster presentation awards
For the oral presentation award, the SAC gathers extended abstracts submitted by students, organizes
reviewers, selects and contacts finalists, organizes review of the 12 finalists at the meeting, and awards
prizes at the meeting. For the poster award, the SAC works with the EO to help convene the award
offered for the last three years by the Zoological Society of London. These awards will be re-proposed at
ICCB 2010.
Courses at global meetings
SAC has successfully organized short courses on paper writing at past meetings. The attendance of such
courses, given by editors in chief of top conservation journals, has always been very high. Given the very
positive response from students, we are planning to re-propose these courses in the future and extend
them to other like paper reviewing and grant writing.
New! Spotlight on student research
This scheme will be started to highlight the profile of its student members outside of the annual meetings,
given that not all students can afford to attend these meetings. The concept is to competitively select a
student from one of our regional sections on a revolving basis, and profile that student in SCB’s media.
The profile would feature details of their research, as well as a broader description of their involvement in
conservation biology. Those profiled will be competitively selected by a panel of judges based on the
quality of their research and their contribution to conservation efforts.
New! More online resources for conservation students
The Student Affairs Committee already provides a number of resources for students on the website,
primarily aimed at students attending meetings. Since the ICCB occurs every two years, we would like to
provide a far more interactive experience.
• A forum for students to discuss conservation-related topics.
• A database for grants, scholarships and other funding schemes.
• A page listing all the forthcoming events relevant to SCB students: conferences, courses, summer
schools.
• All other news relevant to SCB e.g. newsletter, elections
• Surveys aimed at getting your feedback on SCB activities and improving our work for you.
The Wiki format makes it easy for anyone to add his or her own event or news, so feel free to use it! All
you need to do is register via the Wiki-site. There is also an option to receive notices (RSS feed)
whenever new activities or news are placed in the site.
One of the goals of the committee is to be the voice of students, and we encourage you to use the wiki to
make yourself heard.
Piero Visconti, Chair of the Student Affairs sub-committee
David Patrick, Chair of the Conference Awards sub-committee
