e-mail from ABS Central Office (Steve Ramey)

Funds available for 2006/2007

* Student Grants $27,500 ($1,500 from silent auction):: $1,000 and $500 awards, try for 50:50 mix

* EO Wilson Conservation $1,000 :: 1 award of $1000

* Cetacean Behavior up to $2,000 :: $1,000 and/or $500 awards

* Developing Nation $1400 :: 2 awards of $700

Suggested Funding Levels

Awards should be at two levels:

* $1000 for top ranked awards
* $500 for lower ranked awards

If a student does not request the full amount, you may award less at your discretion.

Suggested Methodology

Basically, I (Steve Ramey) would approach this as follows:

1. Rank all proposals
2. Determine a level at which a proposal should NOT be funded. Regardless of the circumstances, we will not fund these.
3. Determine an appropriate cutoff for the $1000 awards (based hopefully on a drop-off in quality or balancing the funds available - try to balance the number of $1000 and $500 awards, in other words; 18 $1000 and 19 $500 would be a good mix, so you probably want to find a break-off at around 18 top awards.
4. Select the highest ranked, funded EO Wilson proposal for the EO Wilson award. If this falls below the $1000 threshold let me know and I'll contact the conservation group to see whether they wish to award the full amount or $500. If no award qualifies for funding, no award is made.
5. Select the highest 1 or 2 funded cetacean behavior proposals for the CBC Awards. These will be made at the level ranked. That is, if the highest CBC proposal is ranked in the $500 range, that is what it will receive. If no proposal is fundable, no award is given.

Basic premise is that judging is independent of the award funding source. We rank them all as objectively as possible, then divvy up the funds afterward as they fall out.

Hope that helps.

Best,
Steve