Call for Papers – AASV 2017 Student Seminar

Veterinary Student Scholarships

The American Association of Swine Veterinarians announces an opportunity for veterinary students to make a scientific presentation at the AASV Annual Meeting in Denver, Colorado on Sunday, February 26, 2017. Interested students are invited to submit a one-page abstract of a research paper, clinical case study, or literature review for consideration. The submitting student must be a current (2016-17) student member of the AASV at the time of submission (the membership application is available here), and must not have graduated from veterinary school prior to February 26, 2017. Submissions are limited to one (1) abstract per student.

Abstracts and supplementary materials (Student Seminar Application and Co-Author Confirmation Form) must be received by Dr. Maria Pieters (pieters@aasv.org) by 11:59pm Central Daylight Time on Wednesday, September 21, 2016 (firm deadline). All material must be submitted electronically. Late abstracts will not be considered. Students will receive an email confirming the receipt of their submission.  If they do not receive this confirmation email, they must contact Dr. Pieters (pieters@aasv.org) by Friday, September 23, 2016 with supporting evidence that the submission was made in time; otherwise the submission will not be considered for judging. The abstracts will be reviewed by an unbiased, professional panel consisting of a private practitioner, an academician, and an industry veterinarian. Fifteen abstracts will be selected for oral presentation in the Student Seminar at the AASV Annual Meeting. Students will be notified by October 14, 2016, and those selected to participate will be expected to provide the complete paper or abstract, reformatted for publication, by November 15, 2016.

• Make sure the Application and Co-Author forms show the year 2017 in the upper right of each form.
• Use Adobe Acrobat Reader DC to complete the application materials. The pdf "preview" application in Mac OS X does not work (it makes the text you enter invisible to us!).
• Do not modify the form or save it in a different format (such as for a word processor). We need the form to be in the original PDF structure for data collection.

Student Seminar:
As sponsor of the Student Seminar, Zoetis provides a total of $20,000 in support to fund travel stipends and the top student presenter scholarship. The student presenter of each paper selected for ORAL presentation receives a $750 stipend to help defray the costs of attending the AASV meeting. Veterinary students whose papers are selected for oral presentation also compete for one of several scholarships awarded through the AASV Foundation. The oral presentations will be judged to determine the amount of the scholarship awarded. Zoetis funds a $5000 scholarship for the student whose paper, oral presentation and supporting information are judged best overall. Elanco Animal Health provides $20,000 in additional funding enabling the AASV Foundation to award scholarships of $2500 each for 2nd through 5th place, $1500 each for 6th through 10th place, and $500 each for 11th through 15th place.

Student Poster Session:
Abstracts that are not selected for oral presentation in the Student Seminar will be considered for presentation in a poster session at the annual meeting. Zoetis, sponsor of the Student Poster Session, has joined with AASV to fund a $250 stipend for each student who is selected and participates in the poster session (the student must personally attend the meeting to participate in the poster session). The abstracts selected for poster presentation will appear in the proceedings of the meeting, and must be re-submitted in proper format for publication by November 15. The guidelines for preparing posters for the display are available at www.aasv.org/annmtg/2017/posters.php.

Veterinary Student Poster Competition:
The presenters of the top fifteen poster abstracts compete for awards ranging from $200 to $500 in the Veterinary Student Poster Competition, sponsored by Newport Laboratories.  See www.aasv.org/annmtg/2017/postercomp.htm for poster judging details.

Instructions for Submission of Abstracts

Please note, the rules for submission should be followed carefully. Abstracts will not be accepted after the deadline date. Abstracts that do not follow the instructions will be returned without review.

Each student may submit one abstract.

Papers having multiple authors may be submitted and presented by only one of the student authors. Distribution of any stipend or scholarship award is at the discretion of the presenting author.

Three categories of submissions will be accepted (Research, Clinical cases, Literature reviews). Submissions from all categories will be treated equally with respect to judging.

ABSTRACT PREPARATION

Abstracts should not exceed 1 page in length. The page should have 1" margins. The typeface should not be less than 12 pt. The body of the abstract may be single-spaced. The use of color is permissible, but keep in mind that colors may not be distinguishable when printed in black and white.

Each student must submit two copies of the abstract:

1) The first copy should have the title as the first line and the author(s) name(s) as the second line followed by a double space and the body of the abstract.

2) The second copy should have the title and body of the abstract only. There should be absolutely no identifiers (i.e., student name, school, state, country, diagnostic lab name, farm name, etc.) on this abstract. Make sure to include the abstract title. This abstract will be used for judging.

The body of the abstract should include:

For Research Papers

• Statement of the problem
• Objective(s)
• Brief materials and methods (including statistical analysis)
• Significant results
• Discussion of how results can be applied by practitioners

For Clinical Cases

• Statement of the problem
• Describe the herd(s) and the time period
• Case history
• State what data was collected, what tests were used, etc
• Discuss the most significant findings and your recommendations
• Describe how your findings will assist the practicing veterinarian
• State what we can learn from this case or the methods used to work up this case
• Itemize the take home message(s) for the audience

For Literature Reviews

(The literature review is meant to be a comprehensive review and a detailed summary of one specific topic)

• State the focus of the paper and include why you think this is an important and timely subject for swine veterinarians
• Discuss the most significant information gathered from the literature review. Describe how the findings will assist practicing veterinarians
• Itemize the take home message(s) for the audience

ABSTRACT SUBMISSION

To be eligible for consideration, a complete submission will include:

• The Student Seminar Application
• Two copies of the one-page abstract (one copy containing identification and one copy containing the abstract title and body but otherwise devoid of identifiers for judging purposes)
• The Co-Author Confirmation Form - submitted by the one veterinarian, AASV member, or university faculty member who is listed as co-author on the Student Seminar Application. This form must be e-mailed separately by the co-author directly to pieters@aasv.org from the co-author's email address listed on the form.

ALL materials must be submitted electronically to:

Dr. Maria Pieters
pieters@aasv.org

ALL materials must be received no later than 11:59pm Central Daylight Time on Wednesday, September 21, 2016.

Students will be notified of the panel's decision by October 14, 2016.

If accepted, the final paper, re-formatted for publication in the proceedings of the meeting, will be due in the AASV office by November 15, 2016. The honorarium will be paid only to students who submit their papers on time. Students who wish to submit their research results to the Journal of Swine Health and Production (JSHAP) may submit an abstract (re-formatted) for the AASV proceedings rather than the full paper (papers published in full in the proceedings are not eligible for publication in JSHAP).

Students will be expected to provide their PowerPoint presentation to organizers in advance of the annual meeting; failure to meet the specified deadline will result in the student not being eligible for scholarship awards.

For more information, contact the AASV office (phone 515-465-5255, fax 515-465-3832, email aasv@aasv.org ).

 

AASV Student Seminar Judging

The initial judging of abstracts is accomplished by having all judges fill out the Written Abstract Evaluation form below. The judges are then asked to rank the abstracts according to these criteria in case of tie scores. The judges’ results are averaged and the abstracts with the best 15 numerical scores are chosen for ORAL presentation. The judges view application information only during the AASV meeting presentations, when they complete the Student Seminar Presentation Evaluation (the next two scoresheets) to determine scholarship award winners.

 

Written Abstract Evaluation Form

(for initial review and selection of abstracts to be presented during the Student Seminar at the AASV Annual Meeting)

Stage of Completion ______

• Complete (3)
• Experiment complete, data collected, and results are being interpreted (2)
• Still collecting data for project (1)
• Project has not begun yet (0)

Interest to Practitioners ______

• High interest and information immediately applicable (3)
• Interesting and some components applicable (2)
• Less interesting or applicable (1)
• Not very interesting or applicable (0)

Subject Contribution _____

• Significant contribution to industry knowledge (3)
• Moderate contribution to industry knowledge (2)
• Slight contribution to industry knowledge (1)
• No real contribution (0)

Abstract Quality ______
Was the abstract well-written (spelling, grammar), easy to follow (organization, clarity), and with good scientific depth?

• Exceptional - well-written and great scientific depth (5)
• Well-written - one minor area needs improvement (4)
• Acceptable - needing two or three minor improvements (3)
• Needs improving - needing moderate improvements (2)
• Needs significant improvements (1)
• Not acceptable - very poorly written; needs to be fully re-written (0)

If the abstract does not rank high enough for oral presentation, should it be allowed to be presented in poster format? _____Yes _____No

 

Student Seminar Presentation Evaluation

(for evaluation of Student Seminar ORAL presentations and selection of student scholarship winners at the AASV annual meeting)

Click here to view an award-winning student presentation

Name:_______________________________

Subject ______

• Original idea of student (4)
• Component of a larger study-student ideas incorporated (3)
• Confirmation of known information but possibly with a new twist (2)
• Confirmation of known information (1)
• Review (0)

Interest to Practitioners ______

• High interest and information immediately applicable (4)
• High interest but information not immediately applicable (3)
• Interesting and some components applicable (2)
• Less interesting or applicable (1)
• Not very interesting or applicable (0)

Subject contribution _______

• Significant contribution to industry knowledge(4)
• Moderate contribution to industry knowledge (3)
• Slight contribution to industry knowledge (2)
• Summary of current information (1)
• No real contribution (0)

Experimental Design Consistent with Expected Outcome

• Very consistent (4)
• Moderately consistent (3 )
• Only slightly consistent (2)
• Experimental design too simple or complex for expected outcome (1)
• Lacked experimental design (0)

Perceived Overall Effort ________

• Significant contribution to study (3)
• Worked hard individually with some advisor help (2)
• Average effort, possibly 50-50 with advisor or others (1)
• Mostly someone else's work (0)

TOP TOTAL __________

Oral presentation	Poor (0)	Fair (1)	Good (2)	Excellent (3)
Eye contact
Posture
Proper use of pointer and/or PowerPoint animation
Poise (displays confidence)
Ability to speak freely without use of notes or text
Personal enthusiasm about the topic
Demonstration of a true understanding of the subject matter
Displays understanding of possible applications of the topic
Quality of presentation (background, fonts, slide layout)
Quality of materials used (charts, tables, photos)
Organization of the presentation
Amount of relevant information covered
Validity of data
Adeptness or ability to handle Q & A orally
BOTTOM TOTAL

OVERALL TOTAL: Top __________ + Bottom __________= Final score__________