Spotlight on Student Research: A Call for Submissions

As part of the Society for Conservation Biology’s continuing drive to recognize the outstanding research being conducted by student members, the Student Affairs Committee (SAC) in collaboration with the Newsletter Editor is pleased to announce the Spotlight on Student Research. Each issue of the Newsletter will focus on one of our student members (undergrad and postgrad) whose research exemplifies the mission of the Society for Conservation Biology to advance the science and practice of conserving the Earth's biological diversity. This profile will feature details of their research, as well as a broader description of their involvement in conservation biology. Those profiled will be competitively selected by a panel of judges based on the quality of their research and their contribution to conservation efforts. Each issue will showcase a student from one of our regional sections: Africa, Austral and Neotropical America, Australasia, Asia, Europe and North America. Joining a section is free for SCB members, visithttp://www.conbio.org/Sections/ for info.

We encourage all student members to submit an application (for those who are not members, details on joining can be found at https://www.conbio.org/Join/). We also encourage anyone who knows of suitable candidates to pass on details of this opportunity.Applications are continually accepted and should be submitted as an attached document in the format shown here: http://scb-students.wikispaces.com/Student+Spotlight! to scb.student.spotlight@gmail.com with the e-mail subject “spotlight” followed by the section name. We will notify the results by email and the winner student’s research will be profiled on the SCB website and on the SCB newsletter. We will periodically assess all applications from a section and nominate the winner for that section.The first section to be evaluated is Europe (applications collected the 15^th March and winner chosen by 31^st March). The following section will be Oceania (applications collected 15^th June and winner chosen by 30^th June). The subsequent order is to be defined. We will accept the following formats: Microsoft Word, Adobe PDF, Word Perfect, Plain Text, Rich Text Format (rtf). Both text and figures of the submission should be in a single document.

Piero Visconti chair Student Affairs Subcommittee

Nora Bynum chair Education and Student Affairs Committee

Luigi Boitani president of SCB

The Student Affair Committee of the European Section is created!

During the last meeting of the Board of Directors of the European Section of the SCB, in February 2010, the Student's Affair Committee of the European Section of the SCB has been officially recognized.

We, at the Student Affair Committee, want to be the voice of students in the Europe Section, promoting student participation in the Society, in its activities and in conservation biology in general.

For this, we wish to create opportunities for students such as promoting interaction with the European community of conservation professionals, organizing workshops on particularly relevant topics (e.g., grant writing, publishing, paper reviewing, teaching), and facilitate student participation at ECCB meetings, starting with the upcoming one in Glasgow.

We have our web page (http://scb-students.wikispaces.com) which we update with upcoming events in the conservation field such as congresses, courses or student competitions, career opportunities, and also current job openings and a list of grant and scholarship funds, along with current news. The “Wiki” format makes it easy for anyone to add their own event or news, so anyone should feel free to use it and announce their own news, event or position. There is also an option to receive notices (RSS feed) whenever new activities or news are placed in the site.

We also make use of the existing Europe Section mailing list (europe@listserv.conbio.org) to send student related news and activities. So if you are interested make sure to subscribe!


The first chair of the SAC-ES is Nuno Curado. He currently works for an environmental NGO in Portugal, in a LIFE+ project. He got to know the SCB-ES in their Summer Schools and in the ECCB’s, which he believes are great ways for students to become involved in conservation and in the Society.


We are currently looking for people who are interested in joining and making an active contribution to the SAC-ES. So, if you are a student, professor, recent graduate, or motivated for student issues, send me an email to nfcurado@hotmail.com and join us!


On behalf of the SAC-ES
Nuno Curado