In an effort to make the awards nomination process in Region 8 more consistent, this year the Region 8 Young Professionals Awards (Region 8 Outstanding Young Professionals Affinity Group Award and Region 8 Young Professionals Exceptional Volunteer Award) have been migrated to the online FluidReview platform, which can be reached via the following link: http://ieee-r8.fluidreview.com/.
Additionally, all awards in the Region have the same nomination deadline. Therefor, the nomination process for the R8 Young Professionals Awards this year is between 30 January and 15 February, and all nominations submitted before or after these dates will not be taken into consideration. We very strongly encourage you to familiarize yourself with the FluidReview platform before the nomination period starts, since you can create an account and access it at any time, so you are ready to fill in the forms and submit the nomination in time. We also advise you to start preparing the required nomination materials as soon as possible, since it usually takes longer than expected. Do not wait until 30 January to start gathering the supporting letters!
There have been some changes in the eligibility criteria as well, namely in order to be considered for the Region 8 Outstanding Young Professionals Award you do not have to submit the annual report to the R8 YP team. Instead vTools activity reports will be required, so make sure all your activities are reported properly to vTools before the nominations deadline. The full eligibility criteria and required documents for the nominations are described below. PLEASE NOTE THAT NO NOMINATIONS WILL BE ACCEPTED VIA EMAIL! All nominations must be submitted through the FluidReview platform.

Region 8 Outstanding Young Professionals Affinity Group Award

(nominations opened on FluidReview between 30 January and 15 February)

• Description:

To recognize Young Professionals Affinity Groups (YP AG) within Region 8 for their efforts, successes and achievements in carrying out the mission of IEEE YP and the aims of IEEE in Region 8 within their Section during the calendar year of 2015. Recognition will be given to the YP AG that displayed the most successful maintenance of ongoing efforts, as well as the development and implementation of new programs. These activities shall leave an important imprint on the Section and on Region 8. The winning AG will receive a certificate providing the citation for the award and a cash prize of $400 granted by the R8 YP Subcommittee to the corresponding YP AG.

• Eligibility criteria:
  • The Young Professionals AG must have at least 20 YP members;
  • All activities from 2015 must be submitted correctly to vTools activities reporting before the nomination deadline (15 February);
  • The Young Professionals AG must not have received another IEEE award in the past 12 months;
  • The $400 prize must be used to support local Young Professionals activities;
  • Affinity Groups which have been awarded the Outstanding Young Professionals Affinity Group award in the past 5 years are not eligible to participate (Nigeria, Croatia, Egypt, Finland, UAE).

• Nomination process:

Proposals for nominations of candidate YP AGs for this award will be made by the Section and supported by 1 letter of endorsement by the Section Chair or another member of the Section’s Executive Committee. Alternatively, a YP Chair can also nominate a YP AG, provided that his/her nomination is endorsed by at least 1 other YP member and preferably also by a member of the Executive Committee of the Section. The documents needed to create a nomination are:

• Nomination letter from Section Chair or another member of the Section’s Executive Committee OR nomination letter from the YP AG chair and another YP AG member and a member of the Section’s Executive Committee; [REQUIRED]
• Motivation letter from YP AG chair; [REQUIRED]
• link to YP AG website or Facebook page, or other online platform; [Strongly recommended]
• Photo report, videos, and other supporting materials to demonstrate the activities and initiatives of the YP AG during 2015 [REQUIRED if no link to website or online platform is provided; it can be submitted as optional extra material even if link to website/online platform is provided]

Region 8 Young Professionals Exceptional Volunteer Award

(nominations opened on FluidReview between 30 January and 15 February)

• Description:

To recognize a volunteer within Region 8 for his/her dedication towards the mission of IEEE Young Professionals. The recognition will be given to a devoted Young Professional member that presents the most successful maintenance of ongoing efforts, leadership skills, and remarkable development and implementation of new ideas and programs within the last year. These activities shall have an important impact on the Section and on Region 8 Young Professional community, and other IEEE members. The winner will receive an award and diploma providing the citation for the award granted by the Region 8 Young Professionals Subcommittee.

• Eligibility criteria:
  • The volunteer must not have received another IEEE award in the past 12 months;
  • The candidate’s Affinity Group must not have been awarded with the Region 8 Outstanding Young Professionals Affinity Group Award in the past 12 months;
  • You can not nominate a volunteer for the Region 8 Young Professionals Exceptional Volunteer Award if the Affinity Group they belong to is nominated for the Region 8 Outstanding Young Professionals Affinity Group Award in the same year;
  • The volunteer must be a Young Professional member of an active Young Professionals Affinity Group in good standing, which has submitted all activity reports to vTools;
  • Members of Region 8 Young Professionals Subcommittee are not eligible to be nominated;
  • Self nominations are not allowed.

• Nomination process:
  • endorsement letter from Section Chair or other member of the Section’s Executive Committee or the YP AG chair ;
  • letter containing short summary of the nominee’s efforts and accomplishments, their impact and results in improving the IEEE and YP community in their YP AG and Section.

If you have any questions or need help with the nomination profess or reaching your Section’s chair or Executive Committee members, please contact us at [email protected]! We are very happy to help in any way we can. We look forward to all your submissions!

We are proud to present this year’s winners for the Region 8 Young Professionals Exceptional Volunteer Award! This year, the Award goes to:

• Vinko Lesic, for his continuous dedication, enthusiasm, and hard work for IEEE as a whole and Young Professionals especially. His efforts are illustrated through his numerous contributions in various teams and committees at Section level, and all the programs and events organized as Young Professionals Croatia Affinity Group Chair, which include the signature Elevate program, where student members are introduced to Young Professionals and membership after graduation, workshops, lectures and presence in a variety of fairs and conferences to promote Young Professionals, organizing this year’s Central European Students and Young Professionals congress, in addition to bridging the gap between students and Young Professionals, and industry and academia.
• Samarth Deo, for his continuous efforts and dedication in promoting Young Professionals in his Section, and working to bring together students, Young Professionals and WiE, in his roles in the Section’s executive committee and as past Young Professionals Sweden Affinity Group Chair, as well as organizing the first edition of the Nordic Students and Young Professionals Congress.

An honorable mention is awarded to Eddy Deeb, for his efforts, enthusiasm and hard work to revive the Young Professionals Lebanon Affinity Group, and the events he and his team have organized this year.

Finally, we would like to praise all the nominees we have had for all their dedication and work! We had lots of nominations which have made the selection process very difficult. We consider ourselves very lucky to be part of a Region that has so many outstanding volunteers, from each of its corners. Our warmest congratulations to Vinko, Samarth and Eddy, and we look forward to receiving many more remarkable nominations next year!

It is our great pleasure to announce the winners of the Region 8 Young Professionals Exceptional Volunteer Award 2014! Despite the difficulties in choosing due to the impressive quality of the many nominations we have received, three candidates were selected to be presented with this year’s award: Ivana Stupar (Croatia Section), Pavlos Kleanthous (Cyprus Section) and Amgad Ibrahim (Egypt Section). Additionally, two special distinctions will be awarded to the runner-ups: David Oyedokun (South Africa Section) and Sofia Gomes (Portugal Section). The Region 8 Young Professionals Subcommittee would like to warmly congratulate the winners, as well as the runner-up candidates and the rest of the nominees, and wish you the very best in your future work! The quality of the nominations has impressed us deeply, and the continuous dedication, skills and hard work of the awarded volunteers is a source of inspiration and motivation for us all to keep on improving. We trust you will continue having a positive impact in the IEEE community and we look forward to seeing your future achievements!

Hall of Fame Award 2014 for outstanding achievements that Inspire, Energize, Empower, and Engage Young Professionals, goes to… CROATIA, R8 !!!

It is a fourth consecutive year that the YP Affinity Group from Region 8 is awarded with HoF Award!

The Region 8 Young Professionals Subcommittee is proud to announce the winner of the Region 8 Outstanding Young Professionals Affinity Group Award for its activities during 2013: this year, the Award goes to Nigeria!

The Nigeria Young Professionals Affinity Group has been working harder every year and now they have reached an outstanding level. Their high quality activities, together with their continued efforts to motivate volunteers and inspire IEEE YP members, make them deservedly win this Award. Congratulations Nigeria!

It is always a hard decision due to the great quality of the YP Affinity Groups in Region 8. We wish this encourages not only the Nigerian AG, but also all the other AGs to keep up pursuing the amazing work, the high motivation and the valuable contributions to IEEE, since those are always the key factors to win this Award.

From the R8 YP Subcommittee, we would like to congratulate the Nigeria YP Affinity Group and would also like to thank all Region 8 Affinity Groups for the great work they are doing.

Among several excellent nominations, the following three individuals have been awarded with the Region 8 GOLD Exceptional Volunteer Award:

Khaled Mokhtar (Egypt)

Tomislav Pokrajcic (Croatia)

Andreas Neumeier (Germany)

Their activities, amazing programs, important involvement in curriculum development, and strong participation at the national level, are great examples from which all of us can learn.

Congratulations on job well done!