In a weak (and possibly not entirely sober) moment in Copenhagen, I told some folks that I would attempt to organize an undergraduate panel for IR 10.0 in Milwaukee. At least one of those folks is holding me to it. This is *NOT* a paper competition (see the Couch Award call at www.cccsir.org if you’re interested in that), and I don’t have time to read and "judge" hundreds of undergraduate papers. But I’m willing to put something together IF I can get a little help from all of you in this way: As you are grading papers at this end of the semester, if you come across an undergraduate’s paper that... 1. Is truly an EXCEPTIONAL paper dealing with QUALITY internet research (you be the judge), and 2. It is likely that your institution would fund the student next fall to get to Milwaukee to present it, and 3. The student is a traditional, 18 to 20-something undergrad -- OR, if a non-traditional student, an undergrad who might be in a position to go on to grad school with this sort of encouragement... ...then talk to the student about it, and if s/he is willing, send me their paper electronically. CLEARLY mark the message as an UNDERGRAD PANEL SUBMISSION. NO GUARANTEES! The panel will be submitted to be considered and accepted (or not) through the regular IR 10.0 vetting process. There’s probably room for about 6 or 8 papers max (I assume undergrad papers are short), and if I receive more than about a dozen I’ll probably throw up my hands and forget the whole thing. But if there are really, really OUTSTANDING undergrad papers in that stack that you are grading, see if the student is interested and if your school will pick up the tab to send them if accepted. If so, send the paper to me and we'll see what happens. -- Mark D. Johns, Ph.D. Associate Professor and Head of the Department of Communication Studies Luther College, Decorah, Iowa USA http://academic.luther.edu/~johnsmar/ ----------------------------------------------- "Get the facts first. You can distort them later." ---Mark Twain