ECIS 2008 offered a doctoral consortium for PhD students in information systems or related areas. The doctoral consortium provided an excellent opportunity for students to improve their thesis proposals through high quality feedback, to explore issues related to academic and research careers in the information systems field, and to establish valuable contacts with other members of the present and future IS research community. The doctoral consortium took place from June 6 to June 8, 2008 near Galway, allowing participants to attend the ECIS 2008 after the doctoral consortium.  All universities from AIS region 2 (Europe, Africa and Middle East) are entitled to appoint doctoral student(s) to the doctoral consortium. Student(s) were asked to prepare a 3,000-word research proposal for her/his thesis. 20 students were selected by the consortium committee. Selection criteria were the quality of the proposal, the research project and the applicant's background. The 20 students admitted to the consortium were mentored by 6 experienced faculty members from different regional European IS research communities. The mentors provided reviews of the proposals, lectures dealing with IS research issues and the future of IS discipline, and feedback to the presentations. The 2008 doctoral consortium was chaired by Eric van Heck . Students were expected to cover travel costs to the consortium venue and all expenses during ECIS. All costs during the consortium were covered by AIS, ECIS and other sponsors. Doctoral students received a free retail copy of Microsoft Office 2007 Ultimate Edition, sponsored by Microsoft.
Deadline for DC Nomination Extended to February 29, 2008 Nomination Requirements - Students could not apply directly, but must have been nominated by an IS faculty member/academic. - There could be more than one nominee per school, university, or institution, but selection was restricted to one nominee per supervisor. - The nomination was in the form of a nomination letter from the nominating faculty member, ensuring that the candidate met the eligibility criteria mentioned above. - Ideally, the nominating faculty member should be the director of the IS doctoral program, the Dean of the College or Faculty, or the IS department's chairperson. If such individuals were not available, the student's dissertation advisor may make the nomination.
Nomination Process To nominate a student, the Director of the Ph.D. program in Information Systems (or other appropriate person, such as the Department Chairperson, the College Dean, or the student's advisor) must have provided the following nomination package consisting of three separate Word or PDF files: - 1. A Nomination Letter
- 2. A Nominee Information Sheet and dissertation abstract
- 3. A Dissertation Proposal Paper prepared by the doctoral student summarising the dissertation research. The proposal should include a progress or status report and should not exceed 3,000 words.
All three items were submitted no later than midnight of February 29 2008. [Click here to submit a nomination to the Doctoral Consortium] Incomplete nomination packages and nomination packages arriving after the deadline were not accepted. Submission Format and Instructions to Authors The paper outlining the candidate's research was in the form of an abbreviated dissertation proposal. ECIS 2008 submission guidlines were provided for proposals. Proposals had a cover page with the following information: - - Title of the proposal
- - Contact information for the candidate, including name, university, email address, mailing address, phone number, and fax number.
The propsal should have provided the research question or topic, a justification for the importance of the research with reference to information systems literature, a presentation of the theoretical basis or framework underlying the research, and a description of research approach and methodology. Also, the proposal should have included a progress report as an appendix, indicating the estimated completion date and the work that remains to be done as of the date of submission of proposal. The proposal may not have exceeded 3,000 words. For convenience we provided the following 2 documents to help persons with their application: Selection Process Selection to the ECIS Doctoral Consortium was competitive. Participants were selected based on the quality of the proposed research, its potential significance and contribution to the IS discipline, the potential contribution the student was expected to make to the Consortium, and the potential benefit of the Consortium to the student's research. This assessment was based upon a review of the Proposal Paper prepared by the doctoral student. The above review was for selection purposes only. There was no expectation that the review would provide feedback for improvement to those candidates not selected to the consortium. The Consortium included a balance of students representing diverse research topics, methods, schools, and cultures. Participation was limited to 20 students. The language for the Consortium was English, and all submitted materials were in English. Students must have had sufficient proficiency in English to participate in the presentations, discussions, and other activities. Students must also have had access to the Internet prior to their arrival at the Consortium. Students were requested to commit to being involved in the Consortium for its entire duration. Notifications about the results of the selection process were sent out via e-mail to all applicants by the end of March 2008. |
