Thomas A. Kochan & Stephen R. Sleigh
Best Dissertation Award

DEADLINE: January 15

PURPOSE: The Labor and Employment Relations Association has established an annual competition for post-doctoral students in the field of industrial relations* or related fields such as history, political science, economics, sociology, etc., as long as they are broadly related to employment relations as reflected in the publications and membership of the LERA. The purpose is twofold: (1) to stimulate greater awareness and interest among doctoral students at colleges and universities of the field of industrial relations, and (2) to provide a vehicle by which an outstanding thesis by a doctoral student can be made more widely known to scholars in the field.

ELIGIBILITY: The Thomas A. Kochan and Stephen R. Sleigh Best Dissertation Award competition is open to doctoral students who completed their dissertation at an accredited college or university in the calendar year preceding the next LERA Annual Meeting. [For example, if the next LERA Annual Meeting is the LERA 74th Annual Meeting, taking place June 2-5, 2022, then the dissertation should have been completed between the dates of January 1, 2021 and December 31, 2021.] Dissertations and correspondence must be in the English language.

AWARDS: The competition prize to be awarded annually shall be $1,000 (one-thousand-dollars). The winner shall be announced at the Association's Annual Meeting and the prize paid within thirty (30) days after the conclusion of the meeting in June. A one (1) year complimentary LERA membership will also be granted to the winning author.

JUDGING: Entries will be judged on the basis of originality, quality of analysis, quality of research, style and organization, practicality and timeliness of subject. The entries will be judged by members of a special Academic Awards Committee.

ENTRY PROCEDURE: Students who wish to enter the competition need to:
1) complete an entry form and
2) submit it with a copy of the thesis, their vita/resume, and a letter from a member of the student's Ph.D. Committee stating why the thesis is especially meritorious.

• A member of the dissertation committee may directly send us a letter of support for the entry, or the student may forward it to us with the rest of the entry materials.

The entry form, thesis, vita/resume, and letter from the student's committee should be uploaded using the
online entry form.

ENTRY DEADLINE: All portions of the entry (entry form, thesis, vita/resume, and letter of support) must be submitted to the LERA on or before January 15. The winners will be notified by mail of their selection by mid-April.

For further information, contact the LERA Office at (217) 333-0072 or email [email protected].

* Industrial Relations is defined as all aspects of the field of labor and employment including employer and employee organizations, labor relations, labor markets, labor economics, human resources, and the workplace.

WINNERS:

2024
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Dissertation at Cornell ILR School	(Honorable Mention) Max Planck Institute Dissertation at the University of Connecticut

2023
Kourtney Koebel

2022
Debbie Goldman

2021
Yao Yao University of Toronto	Xiaoming Bao University of Montreal

2020
Joey Soehardjojo Cardiff University

2019
Phillippe J. Scrimger University of Montréal (Winner)	Sean O’Brady Cornell University (Honorable Mention)	Paulo Marzionna Cornell University (Honorable Mention)

2018
Tingting Zhang Western New England University (Winner)	Katherine Eva Maich Pennsylvania State University (Honorable Mention)

2017
Bradley R. Weinberg Cornell University (Winner)	Jae Eun Lee Ithaca College (Honorable Mention)	Akasemi N. Newsome University of California, Berkeley (Honorable Mention)

*We changed how our awards are dated - they will now be dated the year in which the award is presented.

2015/16
Mark Gough Cornell University	Chunyun Li Rutgers University

2014/15

• Rachel Aleks, Cornell University
• Tashlin Lakhani, Cornell University
• Vivek Soundararajan, University of London (HM)
• Yuanyuan Sun, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (HM)

2013/14

• Alexandre Frenette, CUNY
• Barry Eidlin, University of Wisconsin-Madison
• Michael McCarthy (HM)
• Maite Tapia, Michigan State University (HM)

2012

• Dionne Pohler, University of Saskatchewan
• Lu Zhang, Johns Hopkins University
• Kyoung Won Park, Case Western Reserve University (HM)

2011

• Victor Tan Chen, Harvard University
  
• Alan Benson, MIT
• Kaumudi Misra (HM)
• Amanda Coles (HM)
• Na Fu (HM)

• Chikako Oka, London School of Economics
• Brian Harney, University of Cambridge (HM)
• Xiangmin (Helen) Liu, Cornell University (HM)
• Jing Wang, University of Toronto (HM)

2009

• Mingwei Liu, Rutgers University
• Marco Hauptmeier, Cardiff University
• J. Ryan Lamare, Cornell University (HM)
• Adam Seth Litwin, John Hopkins University (HM)
  

2008

• Ariel Avgar, Cornell University
• David Madland, Georgetown University
• Rocio Bonet, University of Pennsylvania (HM)
• Rupa Banerjee, University of Toronto (HM)
• Kyoung-Hee Yu, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (HM)

2007

• Bethany Moreton, Yale University
• Amanda Tattersall, University of Sydney (HM)
• Laura Ariovich, Northwestern University(HM)

2006

• Andrew Charlwood, Leeds University
• Virginia Doellgast, King's College London
• Mark Price, University of Utah (HM)
• Konstantinos Tzioumis, London School of Economics and Political Science (HM)
  

2005

• Danielle D. van Jaarsveld, University of British Columbia
• Daniyal Zuberi,University of British Columbia
• Mark Anner, Pennsylvania State University (HM)
• Brenda C. Sun, The London School of Economics and Political Science (HM)
  

2004

• Chris Riddell, University of British Columbia
• Eric Verhoogen, Columbia University
• Isabel Fernandez-Mateo, MIT (HM)
  
• Forrest Briscoe, MIT (HM)

2003

• Anthony Zumbolo, New York State Public Employment Relations Board, Mediator
• Haejin Kim, Assistant Professor, Department of Management, School of Business and Public Administration, California State University – Dominguez Hills (HM)
  
• Elizabeth Craig, Assistant Professor, Organizational Behavior Department, School of Management, Boston University (HM)
• Lydia Fraile, Research Assistant to the LARA Project, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Political Science (HM)

2002

• Elizabeth Hoffmann, Purdue University, Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology and Anthropology
• Corinne Bendersky, Assistant Professor, Anderson Graduate School of Management, UCLA, Human Resources and Organizational Behavior (HM)
• Aparna Joshi, Assistant Professor, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Institute of Labor and Industrial Relations (HM)
• George Benson, University of Southern California, Marshall Business School (HM)

2001

• Eunjong Shin, Bureau of Planning and Management, Ministry of Labor, “Unions, Government, and the Politics of Industrial Relations in Korea: Union Bargaining Power and Labor Control Policy from Democratization to IMB Intervention”
• Wendy Boswell, Texas A&M University (HM)
• Alexander Turk, Internal Revenue Service (HM)

2000

• Alex Colvin, Pennsylvania State University
• Clinton Chadwick, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (HM)
  
• Rafael Gomez, London School of Economics (HM)
• Susan Moeser, University of Wisconsin-Madison (HM)
• Karaleah Reichart, California State University, Fullerton (HM)