Call for the Alicia Cascallar Award for An Outstanding Paper by an Early Career Scholar

 

Description of the Award

Alicia Cascallar, who published most of her work as Alicia P. Schmitt, is best remembered for her prolific work in the area of differential item functioning (DIF). She brought passion to her work, and was determined to make sense of DIF findings in an empirically sound manner. Her legacy of methodological and empirical contributions to this area of research provides an important base for future explorations in the area of test fairness. Alicia was an active and visible member of NCME who mentored and encouraged the participation of individuals in the early stages of their careers in educational measurement.

The Alicia Cascallar Award for an Outstanding Paper by an Early Career Scholar has been established to honor Alicia’s professional commitment and accomplishments and to continue her practice of mentoring and encouraging promising new scholars in the area of educational measurement. The award will be given to an early career scholar who presented an outstanding paper at the Annual Meeting.  A cash award of $500, a citation, and a waiver of NCME conference fees for the following year will be provided as partial support for an early career member of NCME to travel to the annual meeting.

Criteria for Eligibility

To be eligible for this award the individual must have presented a paper at the most recent NCME meeting in a paper session or as part of a symposium or panel discussion. The author(s) must be an early career member of NCME (received their doctoral degree within 5 years of the annual meeting).  In addition, professional colleagues who believe that this work represents a significant contribution to the field of applied measurement must endorse the paper.

Selection Criteria

Nominations must include the following items.

  1. A letter of nomination from a professional colleague who is a member in good standing of NCME. 
  2. At least two additional letters of recommendation (in addition to the nominator) are required. 
  3. All endorsements of the papers should list the reasons why this candidate’s paper represents an important contribution to the field of applied measurement.
  4. The candidate’s current curriculum vita.

Papers will be evaluated for their scientific merit, clarity and completeness, the extent to which the material is redundant with previous publications and presentations, and the relevance of the work to practitioners in the field.

Application Procedures

After the Annual Meeting, the nominator will submit his/her nomination letter and the curriculum vitae of the candidate to the address of the Committee Chair. The letters of the other endorsees of the paper should be submitted to the Committee Chair under separate cover. The candidate will submit their paper electronically to the e-mail address listed below.

For multi-authored papers, the candidate must be the first author and must provide a statement that defines his/her contributions to the paper. All other co-authors must provide a statement indicating that the first author was responsible for at least 75% of the effort.

Deadline: Deadline for submission is November 1, 2007. All materials must be submitted by this deadline date. Only complete sets of materials will be considered. The Committee will acknowledge receipt and notify the nominator and candidate if any materials are missing.

Method of Submission
The candidate should submit the paper electronically to this e-mail address: mary.pommerich@osd.pentagon.mil. Fax versions of papers will not be accepted. Nominators and other endorsers of the paper may submit their letters either by e-mail to mary.pommerich@osd.pentagon.mil, or by mail to the Committee Chair at the address listed below.

Mary Pommerich, Chair
Alicia Cascallar Award Committee
Defense Manpower Data Center
DoD Center Monterey Bay
400 Gigling Rd
Seaside, CA 93955-6771

For Additional Information:  Go to the NCME Website or e-mail Mary Pommerich at mary.pommerich@osd.pentagon.mil

Contributions to the Fund can be made to: 

The Alicia Cascallar Memorial Fund/PACF
15 Princess Road
Lawrenceville, NJ  08648

The award will be presented at the NCME Annual Meeting in 2008.