American Academy of Actuaries Announces Academy Award for Research for Outstanding Public Policy Research from an Actuarial Perspective by an Early Career Scholar

By Steve Jackson

Expanding Horizons, June 2023

Note: This article was originally published on the American Academy of Actuaries website on January 31, 2023. It is reprinted here by permission for informational purposes.

The American Academy of Actuaries is making plans to conduct its first annual Academy Award for Research selection during the summer of 2023.

The award will go to an early-career scholar whose work contributes significantly to an actuarial perspective on a public policy issue of interest to U.S. actuaries and public policy makers. The American Academy of Actuaries’ Research Committee has invited submissions for consideration by March 31, 2023, and will announce winner in the summer, which we will follow up.

The award will include a monetary prize of $7,500 and presentations of the work—either in person or virtually—at the Academy’s annual meeting in November in Washington, D.C., and/or at the Actuarial Research Conference in July–August at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa. The Academy will cover reasonable travel expenses.

The award is devoted to research on a particular theme with broad applicability across different policymaking and regulatory environments and across actuarial practice areas. For the inaugural award in 2023, the theme will be Climate Change/Climate Risk.

To be eligible, submissions must meet the following criteria:

• Theme: Related to this year’s theme—for 2023, the theme is climate change/climate risk.
• Publication Type: Can be any of: publications in peer-reviewed journals; papers or articles accepted for publication but not yet published; Ph.D. or other thesis chapters; or other rigorous published research.
• Publication Date: For publications in peer reviewed journals, articles published or accepted for publication since January 1, 2021; for Ph.D. thesis chapters, chapters from theses accepted by the Ph.D. committee as fulfilling the requirement of the degree, or theses leading to the awarding of degrees since January 1, 2021; for other qualifying chapters or publications, those accepted or published since January 1, 2021.
• Education: Authored by an early career scholar, defined as:
  • Ph.D.s who have received their degrees within the previous five calendar years (e.g., for the 2023 award, 2018–2022); or
  • Those currently enrolled or enrolled within the previous five calendar years in a Ph.D. program; or
  • Those whose highest academic degree was awarded within the previous five calendar years.
• Subject Matter: The subject matter of the research relates to an issue of insurance or financial risk of interest to United States public policy makers, regulators, or interested stakeholders.
• Actuarial perspective: The analysis presented is clearly actuarial in perspective. Factors to be considered for this criterion are:
  • Most importantly, the nature of the work, and whether it reflects the careful attention to factors such as data quality, statistical or mathematical analysis, and financial risk characteristics of actuarial work; and
  • The Ph.D. degree (or highest degree obtained), and whether it was or will be awarded by a Department of Actuarial Science, or in a broader field (e.g., Mathematics, Statistics, Economics, Public Policy) with a concentration or significant focus on actuarial science or its equivalent; and/or
  • Whether the submitting researcher, their coauthors, or their supervising faculty advisers are members of an actuarial association or have made contributions to the actuarial literature.
• Country of Residence: Subject to meeting the other criteria, anyone in any country may submit an article or thesis chapter for consideration.
• Deadline: Submitted by March 31, 2023.

If you believe that you have an article or thesis chapter that ought to be considered as:

• an actuarial perspective related to climate change/climate risk;
• with relevance to United States public policy making;
• by an early career scholar;

but are unsure whether the eligibility criteria as specified have been met, please contact Steve Jackson (sjackson@actuary.org) to discuss.

To submit, please complete the online submission form.

All submissions will be acknowledged soon after receipt. Finalists for the award will be notified in May, with a winner notified in June. Arrangements will then be discussed for presentation of the winning research at the Actuarial Research Conference in August and/or at the Academy’s annual meeting in November. The Academy will cover reasonable travel expenses.

If you know someone who you believe should consider submitting for this award, please forward this notice to them.

Statements of fact and opinions expressed herein are those of the individual authors and are not necessarily those of the Society of Actuaries, the editors, or the respective authors’ employers.

Steve Jackson, Ph.D., is the director of research (Public Policy) at the American Academy of Actuaries. Steve can be reached at sjackson@actuary.org.