For Students

As part of our ongoing efforts to encourage and support the next generation of wetland scientists and practitioners, we offer several opportunities for students to develop skills that will help them in their wetland careers. Participating as a student (either by presenting or attending) is also a wonderful opportunity to network with wetland science professionals.

See below for more information on the opportunities we offer for students at the Wetland Science Conference.

Student Scholarships

As we have in recent decades, we expect to offer a limited number of student scholarships that will cover the full cost of registration in exchange for a nominal amount of volunteering during the conference. Priority for these scholarships will be given to students who are presenting at the conference (oral or poster presentation); however, you need not be presenting in order to apply.

Please check back later in 2026 for 2027 scholarship information. The conference will be held February 23-25, 2027 in Elkhart Lake, WI.

Registration Fee Discount for Students

If a scholarship isn’t for you, we offer a 50% discount on registration fees for students.

Student Presentation Competition

To encourage high-quality student presentations, we host a student presentation competition, awarding a cash prize to the best oral presentation and to the best poster presentation by a student. Current students and recent graduates who are presenting their student research at the conference are eligible to participate.

Students interested in participating should indicate this when submitting their abstracts. The call for presentations will open the fall before the conference. 

The information below provides an overview of the types of attributes on which presentations and posters are evaluated.  The criteria for the annual Wetland Science Conference student competitions is subject to change.

Student Competition Evaluation Rating Criteria
Scientific Content

Title and Abstract

  • Title and abstract informative, concise, well-written, and correlates with presentation

Content

  • Introduction & background with pertinent literature cited
  • Objectives clearly stated & concise
  • Materials & methods (study design) clear & concise
  • Results & discussions clear, concise, logical & accurate
  • Significance of results to field of study
Poster Display or Oral Presentation

Organization

  • Logical order, minimum redundancy, effective use of space, good transition between sections, pieces tie together

Text, Figures, and Tables

  • Legible with large fonts, color contrast, no conflicting backgrounds
  • Text without grammatical errors; not excessively wordy
  • Effective use of photos, figures and/or tables, coordinated with text