Song Prize Award

When Professor Pill-Soon Song left the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry in 1987 he gave Texas Tech a donation of $4,000, the interest on which is awarded annually as a prize for the best Ph.D. degree dissertation in the department. The first award was given in 1991.

To Dr. Pill-Soon Song,
who was a stalwart member of our faculty for 20 years, we raise the hat and record our warmhearted thanks.

Procedure for Selecting the Song Prize Winner

In January of each year, a solicitation is sent out asking each of the five departmental divisions (analytical chemistry, biochemistry, inorganic chemistry, organic chemistry, and physical chemistry) to nominate the best dissertation written by a doctoral student in their respective divisions during the previous calendar year. The deadline for the nominations is February 1. After receiving the nominations, a subcommittee of the Awards Committee comprised of faculty from each of the divisions reads each of the nominated dissertations. The dissertations are evaluated on the basis of three criteria:

1. Comprehensibility for a general reader, especially of the summary and introductory sections.
2. Completeness and extensiveness of the work. Have all basic questions pertaining to the research inquiry been answered, or at least addressed?
3. Creativity, innovation, impact on the field, and extent to which the student has directly contributed to these aspects. Advice on these matters will be sought from a non-advisor member of the dissertation committee.

These criteria are weighted roughly equally in making an overall assessment for a given dissertation. A five-point scale is used for each of these three criteria.

The scores from all the members of the Song Prize Subcommittee are added. The dissertation with the highest total score wins the Song Prize.

The Song Prize winner is recognized at the annual departmental Awards Ceremony in late April or early May. The award comes with a certificate, a $1000 prize, and a name-plate that is placed on the Song Prize plaque that is prominently made visible in the department's “Strive for Honor” display case which contains the other plaques honoring students and staff for various academic and service achievements.