eOrganic is holding 2 article competitions for students to win a trip to participate in either the American Society for Horticultural Science (ASHS) in Orlando, FL or the Tri-Societies Conference (ASA, CSSA, SSSA) in Phoenix, AZ in 2020.
This is a great opportunity for students to:
- Share your research on organic horticulture, crops, soil science and agronomy
- Meet colleagues in your field
- Present at a professional society conference, and
- Publish a peer-refereed extension article that will be publicly available
- It is also a chance to learn about and practice writing up your research in a way that is accessible and understandable to farmers and agricultural educators and professionals.
These competitions are funded by a grant from the NIFA Organic Research and Extension Initiative (OREI) program. Learn more about how to enter the 2 competitions below.
ASHS Conference eOrganic Article Competition
The deadline for this competition has passed but you can still enter the Tri-Societies Competition until March 18! eOrganic and the ASHS Organic Interest Group invite all undergraduate and graduate students with knowledge and experience in organic horticulture to submit an article on an organic horticultural topic for publication to eOrganic (along with an abstract summarizing that article) to this competition. Articles must comply with the eOrganic Instructions for Authors. Please also read the the “How to Write an eOrganic Article” section below. The articles must be written in a style that would be useful to farmers and agricultural advisers.
Article submissions will be evaluated by a panel including ASHS Organic Interest Group members and eOrganic editorial staff for relevance, quality, clarity and compliance with eOrganic’s Instructions for Authors. Authors of the five highest scoring articles will travel to the 2020 ASHS conference in Orlando, Florida, which takes place on August 9-13, 2020. Each winner will give an oral presentation summarizing his/her article in a Planned Oral Session at the conference. The articles will be published to the eOrganic public website after successfully completing eOrganic’s peer refereed review process. The abstracts of presented papers will be published in an online supplement to HortScience in the fall of 2020. After the conference, eOrganic will reimburse domestic (US) airfare, 3 nights hotel, 3 days meals and conference registration fees for a total of up to $1500 for each of the 5 student winners. (Does not include tours or special events).
Tri Societies Conference eOrganic Article Competition
eOrganic invites undergraduate and graduate students with knowledge and experience in organic crop science, soil science, plant breeding and agronomy to submit an article on one of these topics for publication to eOrganic (along with an abstract summarizing the article) to this competition. Articles must comply with the eOrganic Instructions for Authors. Please read the instructions carefully in the “How to Write an eOrganic Article” section below. The articles must be written in a style that would be useful to farmers and agricultural advisers.
Article submissions will be evaluated by a panel including eOrganic editorial staff and ASA organic interest group members for relevance, quality, clarity and compliance with eOrganic’s Instructions for Authors. Authors of the five highest scoring articles will receive support for their travel to the 2020 Tri-Societies Conference in Phoenix Arizona which takes place November 8-11, 2020. Each winner will give an oral presentation summarizing his/her article in an oral session at the conference. The articles will be published to eOrganic public website after successfully completing eOrganic’s peer refereed review process. After the conference, eOrganic will reimburse domestic (US) airfare, 3 nights hotel, 3 days meals and conference registration fees for a total of up to $1500 for each of the 5 winners. (Does not include tours or special events). eOrganic cannot reimburse international travel expenses.
Timeline and Deadlines for competitions
- November, 2019: Announcement for both competitions and call for articles.
- February 26, 2020: Article submission deadline for ASHS Conference. Competition. Articles need to be submitted by midnight Pacific Time to Alice Formiga at eOrganic (alice.formiga@oregonstate.edu).
- March 5, 2020: Authors (successful and unsuccessful) for ASHS Conference Competition will be notified.
- March 15, 2020: Winning abstracts will be paid for and submitted by eOrganic for the ASHS Conference oral session.
- March 18, 2020: Article submission deadline for Tri Societies Conference Competition. Articles need to be submitted by midnight Pacific Time to Alice Formiga at eOrganic (alice.formiga@oregonstate.edu).
- March 31, 2020: Authors (successful and unsuccessful) for Tri Societies Conference Competition will be notified.
- May 15, 2020: Winning abstracts will be paid for and submitted by eOrganic for the Tri-Societies Conference oral session.
- August 9-13, 2020: ASHS Conference: The eOrganic/ASHS organic professional interest group planned oral will be scheduled by ASHS during the ASHS conference. We will let you know the date and time as soon as we find out. Travel reimbursement requests must be submitted after the conference and by August 25, 2020.
- November 8-11, 2020: Tri-Societies Conference. The organic oral session will be scheduled by the Tri-Societies staff before the conference. We will let you know the date and time as soon as we find out. Travel reimbursements must be submitted by November 30, 2020.
How to Write an eOrganic Article
eOrganic is the national Organic Agriculture Community of eXtension, and our articles are published at http://eorganic.org. We publish science-, and farmer experience based information, as well as information on how to comply with organic regulations. We also host websites for organic research projects.
Important: eOrganic articles are not the same thing as a scientific journal article or a research report. As detailed in our Instructions for Authors, eOrganic articles should be written in a style similar to an Extension article. They must be understandable and accessible to eOrganic’s diverse public audience of farmers, Extension personnel, certifiers, inspectors, nonprofit staff, researchers, and others. They should summarize science- or experience-based information, and provide practical recommendations that organic farmers and advisors can use. In other words, they should not be too technical or assume that readers know what acronyms or scientific terms mean, and tables and figures must be easy to understand. The articles must be written in a style that would be useful to farmers and agricultural advisers and be written clearly, with correct spelling and grammar. They should contain citations and links to additional resources so that readers can learn more about the topic. Before you start, it would be helpful to consult with your advisor, and ask your advisor to review and give feedback on the article!
In the fall of 2019, eOrganic ran a 4-webinar class entitled How to Write an eOrganic Article. You can find the class recordings and presentations at https://eorganic.org/node/33929. They explain how to write eOrganic articles, where to find reliable organic management information, how to summarize scientific information for a public audience, and how the articles for the competition will be judged and reviewed. Reviewing these materials closely will help you create a winning submission. If the article does not comply with the eOrganic Instructions for Authors it will not be considered for the competition.
Articles must be original, i.e. not previously published elsewhere. Authors must search existing eOrganic content at http://eorganic.org, to make sure eOrganic does not currently have an article on this topic, and that the submitted article complements existing eOrganic content. eOrganic articles should add value and specifically address a horticultural topic in organic farming systems, i.e. they should not simply be reproductions of conventional sources with the non-compliant information removed. Articles must be well written, with correct spelling and grammar, and formatted by the author according to the eOrganic Instructions for Authors before submission. Please have any coauthors and your supervising professor review your article.
Priority will be given to articles that summarize the best science-, practice- and regulation-based information on a topic. Authors can, but they are not required to include their own research findings.
Before you start: Read examples of eOrganic Articles
- Options for Including Cover Crops in High Tunnel Rotations in the Northern United States (2018 winner)
- Solarization and Tarping for Weed Management on Organic Farms in the Northeast USA (2018 winner)
- How to Use Paper Bags to Protect Organic Peaches from Insects and Diseases in the Southeastern United States (2018 winner)
- Spotted Wing Drosophila: Biology, Behavior and Organic Management
- Abrasive Weeding: A New Tool for Weed Management in Organic Agriculture
- Managing Cucumber Beetles in Organic Farming Systems
- Organic Management of Late Blight of Potato and Tomato (Phytophthora infestans)
Frequently Asked Questions
- Can my article be entered into both competitions? Your article needs to fit into the scope of the conference you would like to attend. If your article could fit the scope of both conferences, please specify your first and second choice of conference. A student who submits one article will only attend one conference if selected as a winner.
- If I do not win the competition, can my article still be published on the eOrganic website? We can only award 5 winners for each competition, but if we have too many excellent submissions, any articles that the judges think meet eOrganic standards can still be submitted for review and publication.
- How long should my article and abstract be? We do not have a minimum or maximum word count for the article, but the length should be appropriate to summarize your topic for a public audience. Please see the article examples provided above. The abstract, however, should be no more than 400 words, and you should list all authors with institution/organization/department and contact information (email, phone, mailing address). List submitting author first. Indicate funding source/s as applicable (NIFA OREI or ORG, OFRF, Western SARE, etc).
- Why do you want articles that are written for the general public if I’m going to present my article at a scientific conference? eOrganic exists to share information on organic farming and research with the public, so we are asking for articles written for a general audience of producers and agricultural educators, advisors and professionals. You will present your topic to other students and researchers at the conference session, but the article should be written in a style that is accessible and useful to practitioners.
- If the article has multiple authors, can they all travel to the competition? eOrganic can only reimburse one student author per article for travel to the competition.
Questions? Contact us here.
