The EthOR Award is organised by the EURO Working Group on “Ethics and OR”, a network that gathers scientists, lecturers and professionals in the field of Operational Research who are committed to inspire OR researchers, teachers, students, consultants and decision-makers to integrate ethical aspects and considerations in their OR research, teaching, consultancy and decision-making (info: http://euro-online.org/web/ewg/24/euro-working-group-on-ethics-and-or).

The purpose of this award is to distinguish outstanding work by young graduate OR researchers promoting ethical dimensions in OR-based studies. Our aim is to encourage young researchers, as members of the future generation of managers and decision-makers, in developing and implementing Operations Research techniques for solving contemporary problems presenting ethical dimensions. Many fields of application may be considered like energy, environment, health care, peace studies, economics, corporate social responsibility, finance and others.

The third edition of the EthOR Award will be awarded at the EURO-2016 conference in Poznan, Poland (EURO XXVIII, July 3-6, 2016). Applications will be strictly limited to young graduate researchers who are still PhD students at the time of the conference in July, or who did complete their PhD after July 2015.

To apply, the researcher should prepare an extended abstract of maximum 6 pages summarising his or her research work relevant for OR and ethical issues. This work must be in direct connection with the PhD thesis, and/or with published or submitted articles for which the applicant is the main author. Furthermore an accompanying letter must be joined giving the candidate details, setting out the general framework of the PhD research, and explaining why it is relevant for the EthOR Award.

Some joined research articles may support the application.

Both the extended abstract and accompanying letter should be sent electronically (pdf) BEFORE 15th April to Dr. Erik Kropat (email: [email protected]), Chair of the EURO Working Group and of the Award Selection Committee, or to Prof. Pierre Kunsch (e-mail: [email protected]) member of the board of the EURO Working Group.

The selected finalists will be requested to present their work in a special session of the EWG Stream held during the conference. An important condition to be eligible for the award is that the candidate must present himself or herself his/her work. Presentations by someone else will not be accepted.

Each presenting candidate for the award will receive an official certificate of excellence in developing OR techniques and/or applications contributing to ethical decision-making.

In addition the winner will get full reimbursement of the registration & gala dinner fees at the EURO-2016 conference, and will be also cordially honoured as keynote speaker for the next event of the EWG on “Ethics and OR” after the EURO-2016 conference.

Entry requirements
The extended abstract and the accompanying letter must be written in English. As said above, they should clearly explicit the ethical aspects present in the submitted work:

• either as a direct theoretical contribution to Ethics in OR,
• Or, as an important part of some practical problem solved with OR techniques: it should be evidenced how Ethics is taken into account in the decision-making process, in the valuation of alternatives, in the interactions between analysts, decision-makers and stakeholders, etc.
  The candidates may be member(s) of the EWG, or desiring to join.

Selection Process
The EWG Board will designate an EthOR Award committee that should not have any relationship with any of the applicants. The selection process will proceed in the following steps:
Firstly, the submissions will be analysed by the committee for acceptability in order to select a shortlist of maximum three finalists. In case no finalist can be found the award will not be made.
The following non-exhaustive aspects will be scrutinised:

1. Novelty and originality of the contribution.
2. Pertinence and applicability for solving contemporary issues with ethical dimensions.
3. Explicit references to the contributions to Ethics and OR as stressed in the accompanying letter and the extended abstract
4. Quality and clarity of the presented documents.

If necessary for preparing the shortlist, the committee may require additional information from applicants.
Secondly, the selected finalists will be informed before May 15th and requested to submit a short abstract for the Award Session of the stream on “Ethics and OR”, that will be held during the EURO-2016 conference. The president of the jury will communicate the access codes to the finalists so they can submit their abstracts to the invited sessions.

The finalists should be able to register to the Euro conference under early registration conditions for students.

Finally, in this session, the finalists will have 20 minutes to present their work, explaining details and answering questions from the members of the award committee. They will make the final deliberation in private after the presentations to designate the winning finalist, although the award may not be made if the quality of the presentations is not considered sufficient. The nominee will be announced by the president of the award committee on the last session of the stream on “Ethics and OR”. The certificate(s) will then be handed over to the finalist(s).