# 2017 Student Paper Award

RAS (Railway Applications Section), a subdivision of INFORMS (Institute for Operations Research and Management Sciences), is sponsoring a student research paper contest on analytics and fact-based decision making in railway applications with three cash prizes totalling US$1,750. Awards are offered at three levels:$1,000 First Place, $500 Second Place,$250 Third place.

In addition, the First Place paper will be offered expedited review in the journal Networks, with a recommendation from the RAS judges. More details about this journal can be found here. RAS is grateful to its 2017 sponsors for supporting this award.

Thank you to our student paper award sponsor, Tech Mahindra!

22 September 2017, Award Winners Announced!

First Place
Thomas Breugem, Erasmus University Rotterdam, An Optimization Framework for Fairness-oriented Crew Rostering

Second Place
Sofie Van Thielen, KU Leuven, Benefits of a dynamic impact zone when dealing with train conflicts

Third Place
Pan Shang, Tsinghua University, Equity-oriented skip-stopping schedule optimization in an oversaturated urban rail transit network

See the Abstracts here

Overview

Railway Applications is a section of INFORMS (Institute for Operations Research and Management Sciences). RAS provides a forum for bringing together practitioners, consultants, and academics interested in applying Operations Research and Management Science techniques (OR/MS) to the railroad industry. The student paper contest is intended to stimulate interest in OR/MS applications to railways, and to encourage students to pursue an education in railway applications.The methodologies of OR/MS include mathematical programming, simulation, analytics, data analysis, and scientific management. The focus in RAS and INFORMS is the management of technology, resources, and service delivery.

## Rules

1. Award recipients must travel to the INFORMS Annual Meeting, usually held in the fall in the United States, at their own expense and give a presentation on their paper. Recipients will receive instructions on when and how to attend. Failure to present disqualifies the recipient and the award is re-allocated.
2. The paper must be written by one or more students enrolled in an academic institution at any time during the year ending on the submission deadline. For example, a student now employed who graduated earlier in the year is acceptable.
3. One or more advisers may appear as co-authors of a paper, but the student(s) must be the "primary author" and the content must be at least 80% attributable to the student authors. Advisers of finalist papers will be contacted to verify this information.
4. The paper must demonstrate a subject area of OR/MS that is representative of INFORMS subjects, and may apply to any railway system (freight, passenger, heavy rail, light rail, etc.).
5. The paper must represent original research (not literature reviews) and not have been previously published in a peer-reviewed journal, book, or published conference proceeding.
6. The paper must follow the formatting and length instructions provided with the submission instructions. Papers are expected to follow the general expectations of structure and length for journal publication. The judges may reject papers that are excessively long or inappropriately formatted. Generally, papers should be less than 40 pages when double spaced.
7. The judges reserve the right to reject papers at an early stage in the competition due to irrelevant subject matter or fundamental errors in composition.
8. Papers must be written in US or UK English.
9. In the event of any disagreement over the enforcement of the rules, the decision of the judges is final.

## How to enter

Deadline for submission is July 31, 2017. Extended to August 7!

Record your contest entry at: https://dtumanagement.eu.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_8vNvruj8Z65dcZD

Do not send papers or submissions to this email address.

Dr. Steven Harrod, Technical University of Denmark - email: stehar@dtu.dk

RAS reserves the right to suspend the contest if no suitable papers are received.