Buell & Braun Awards > Policies

Murray F. Buell had a long and distinguished record of service and accomplishment in the Ecological Society of America. Among other things, he ascribed great importance to the participation of students in meetings and to excellence in the presentation of papers. To honor his selfless dedication to the younger generation of ecologists, the Murray F. Buell Award for Excellence in Ecology is given to a student for the outstanding oral paper presented at the ESA Annual Meeting. E. Lucy Braun, an eminent plant ecologist and one of the charter members of the Society, studied and mapped the deciduous forest regions of eastern North America and described them in her classic book, The Deciduous Forests of Eastern North America. To honor her, the E. Lucy Braun Award for Excellence in Ecology is given to a student for the outstanding poster presentation at the ESA Annual Meeting.

A candidate for these awards must be an undergraduate, a graduate student, or a recent doctorate not more than 9 months past graduation at the time of the meeting. The paper or poster must be presented as part of the program sponsored by the Ecological Society of America, but the student need not be an ESA member. To be eligible for these awards the student must be the sole or senior author of the oral paper (Note: symposium talks are ineligible) or poster. Papers and posters will be judged on the significance of ideas, creativity, quality of methodology, validity of conclusions drawn from results, and clarity of presentation. While all students are encouraged to participate, winning papers and posters typically describe fully completed projects. The students selected for these awards will be announced in the ESA Bulletin following the Annual Meeting. A certificate and a check for $400 will be presented to each recipient at the next ESA Annual Meeting. If you wish to be considered for either of these awards, you must send the following to the Chair of the Student Awards Subcommittee: (1) the application form, (2) a copy of your abstract, and (3) a 250- word or less description of why/how the research presented will forward the field of ecology. Because of the large number of applications for the Buell and Braun awards, applicants may be pre-screened prior to the meeting, based on the quality of the abstract and this description of the significance of their research. The application form, abstract, and research justification must be sent by mail, fax, or e-mail to the Chair of the Student Awards Subcommittee.