Submitting to student paper competitions

[anabeldm9]

I don't think this has been covered (based on my search of this site) yet, but I am wondering about entering student paper competitions.

My field has smaller divisions within our main association and I belong to several of them. One division recently announced a student paper competition (to coincide with the big national conference in the fall, which I'm attending) and I'm wondering whether or not to apply. I have a paper that will be done soon that I'm writing with my PI looking at a research question using her data. I will be first author and of course she will also be on it (we have done this before with another paper I wrote using same data). 

My question is: should I submit to the paper competition even though 1) it's not my data (issue is not whether my advisor approves, more about how it looks to not have your own data yet) and 2) the topic is a small sub-set of the field and while it's interesting, it's not earth-shattering stuff. I feel kind of stuck on the fact that I work with this data that is interesting and fruitful, but is not mine and is not the kind of data I'm super passionate about, which I assume (and plan!) my dissertation data will be.

How do others approach paper competitions? Should I wait until I have something from my dissertation research, which is still a year away for me?

Any advice appreciated!

[fuzzylogician]

I can't answer the "own data" question, that seems too field specific. Mine is different enough that I can't have an informed opinion.

As for the "not earth shattering" part, that's the part you leave up to the judges.

You may win and you may lose. The only thing that's sure is that if you never even try, you are not going to get anywhere. If the only thing holding you back is fear that you won't win, that's not a valid consideration as far as I am concerned. You're going to get so many rejections as part of an academic career, you need to be able to brush them off and try again. This is no different. I say, if you are proud of the work and your paper meets the competition criteria,* what's the harm in trying?** This is work that you are doing anyway and it is part of your research profile, I see no reason not to try to win awards for it. You can always choose not to highlight it in job applications and your CV later on, if your dissertation research takes you in a different direction; you are generally not required to put everything on your CV, you can choose what to concentrate on. So yeah, I'd probably go for it.*** 

* caveat 1: check to see if there are restrictions on authorship, source of data, or anything else relevant that may prevent you from submitting. Those do occasionally exist.
** caveat 2: in some fields it's said that you should hold your publications close to your vest until they are in print before presenting or giving away too much. You may also not want to publish too much from your dissertation if you are in a book-based field. 
*** really the best course of action is to consult with your advisor, who knows you, the work, and your field, the best. S/he can help you make a more informed decision than we can. 

[GreenEyedTrombonist]

Are you planning to attend/present at this conference? If yes, submit to the paper competition. My advice will almost always be to submit to the paper competition. Last year I submitted to a paper competition even though what I was presenting on for the conference was a different setup than the main presentations, was just exploratory research, and was parallel to, but not included in, my actual research project. I still received 3rd place.

I completely agree with @fuzzylogician about checking for restrictions (the competition I mentioned above did not allow co-written papers for submissions). Also, definitely check with your advisor. Chances are, they know the conference's inner-workings better than you and can provide some insight.

Hope this helps!