Research and Mentoring Awards

In celebration of the exceptional research and mentorship taking place in the college, CBS has created a series of awards to recognize the commitment, inspiration and guidance provided by our faculty, staff and students. If you are interested in nominating someone for a research or mentorship award, please take note of the terms of eligibility and relevant deadlines of each.

CBS Teaching and Mentorship Awards

Full details regarding the eligibility, criterion and nomination requirements can be found on the CBS Sharepoint site (accessible to faculty, staff and students).

Five awards are available:

• Faculty Teaching Excellence Award
• Staff Teaching Award of Excellence
• Graduate Mentoring Award
• Graduate Teaching Assistant Award of Excellence
• Mentorship Award for Postdoctoral Fellows

CBS Graduate Student Best Paper Prize

Through this award, CBS recognizes exceptional research papers published by graduate students during the preceding year. There are three awards in total, valued at $500 each, with one award granted per department.

Eligibility: Students from the College of Biological Sciences who conducted research and who have produced a first-author or co-first author original research paper that was published (or accepted) into a peer-reviewed journal in the previous year. This includes current students and recent graduates (no timelines post-graduation). Where two eligible students are co-first authors, they may be jointly nominated. 

Note: A student may be nominated for a paper only once (either as accepted or published). Students can hold the award only once.

Students must be nominated by their primary advisor. Faculty nominators must submit the following:

• A copy of the published paper (or pre-print, along with notification of acceptance from the journal)
• A cover letter that addresses the following adjudication criteria:
  • the originality, impact and/or other significance of the paper to the discipline
  • the student’s role in experimental design, carrying out the experiment(s), and preparing the manuscript. The letter should also provide any additional information that may be relevant (e.g. quality of the journal). The length of this letter should not exceed two pages.

Nominations must be submitted to the CBS Associate Dean of Research office (cbsadr@uoguelph.ca) by April 1. Recipients will be selected by the CBS Graduate Awards Committee and notified in May. Full terms and conditions are available here.