How to enter

To enter into any of the Dissection or Museum Prize categories you must produce a poster*
displaying the work. Entry into the Open Competition may also be by poster or where
possible submission of the actual piece of work*. All entries will be displayed at the Autumn
Scientific Meeting. The entries are judged anonymously wherever possible by a panel of
experienced anatomists and the results are announced at the Autumn Scientific Meeting.

All entries along with a completed competition entry form must be submitted by email to
the following address education@anatomical-sciences.org.uk by the published
competition closing date. Any entrant wishing to submit an entry into the Open Competition,
which is not in the form of a poster, should contact the education officer at the above
address to discuss their submission.

All entrants will receive, via email a certified letter of participation from the IAS. Entry to the
competition is free to members and £5 per person (regardless if you are entering as an
individual or in a group) for non-members. Once your entry has been submitted, you will be
sent further details regarding online payment.
* Please see below for the competition rules and entry specifications.

Click here to view our entry specifications (or scroll down).

Student Dissection Prize Entry – 12 Months Free Membership.

If you enter the Student Dissection Prize as a non IAS member it will cost you £5. For this price you will also receive one years’ free membership on the basis that you also fill in a Standing Order Mandate form to pay for future years’ membership.

Joining the IAS as a student outside of the competition would normally would cost you £15 so don’t miss this perfect opportunity to join us at the IAS. Please fill in the form below in its entirety and submit alongside your entry.

Entry Specifications – Poster

All poster entries must be submitted in PDF format. There are no restrictions on layout, but the following conditions must be adhered to:

Poster size: A3 paper (297 x 420mm) – landscape or portrait
Background: Any uniform colour
Images:

• Must be originals with no alterations (apart from being cropped or resized)
• No limit on number of images
• A black or white border may be added around images

Text:

• Font – Arial
• Colour – black or white
• Size – any
• Poster must have a title

Further:

• Labelling of key features to provide context is acceptable.
• Text boxes with brief descriptions is acceptable.
• Excessive labelling or text which obscures or detracts from viewing the subject of the poster will be marked down.
• Poster must be anonymous, all entrant details must be confined to the Competition Entry Form.

Competition Rules:

• All entries are expected in the form of a poster except in the Open Competition
  where presentation of the actual piece of work (e.g. book, poster, video etc.) may be
  possible.
• All posters must adhere to the criteria outlined in the specifications below.
• The poster must be anonymous, all entrant details must be confined to the
  Competition Entry Form which must be completed and submitted alongside the poster.
• All entries must be an original piece of work and cannot have been entered into any
  IAS competition category previously.
• All entries must have a title, which is displayed on the poster, on the competition
  entry form and if possible on any alternative submitted work.
• All contributors to the work must be notified of the intention to submit the work
  into the competition and must either be a named entrant or mentioned in the
  acknowledgments.
• Where contributors are mentioned in the acknowledgements, their type of
  contribution must be listed e.g. John Smith (anatomical advice), Jane Doe (technical
  support with specialist equipment).
• When the entrants work is a partial contribution towards a larger project, this must
  be made clear on the poster or as a separate statement to accompany any
  alternative piece of work.
• Where the combined size of all documents involved in the entry exceeds 10MB, the
  documents should be compressed (zipped) prior to submission.
• All named entrants who are non-members must pay the £5 entry fee. Failure on the
  part of any named entrant to pay the fee before a given deadline will result in the
  entry being withdrawn from the competition.

How the Entries are Judged

Every effort is made where possible to keep all entries anonymous during the judging process, which takes place in advance of the Autumn Scientific Meeting. Judges are provided with digital copies of all the submitted posters and are required to allocate each poster a mark and provide written feedback on each entry. This anonymized feedback can be made available to entrants upon request. The entry in each category with the highest average mark is awarded the winner. Any other entries with a mark of over 75% will receive a Merit. In the Student Dissection Prize in the addition to Merits the judges award a “Best Animal Dissection” and a “Best Human Dissection” with the category winner being whichever entry of the two has the highest score. The judges reserve the right to not award any entrant as category winner.

The judges use the following criteria in assessing the entries:

Criteria for Dissection and Museum Prize Categories

• Does the poster conform to the “poster specifications”?
• Is the subject of the poster clear and of sufficient size?
• Is the subject displayed on the poster technically complex?
• Is the subject displayed on the poster intellectually complex?
• How useful is the subject of the poster as a teaching aid?
• Does the subject of the poster have aesthetic appeal?
• Is any labelling or text present on the poster beneficial to the display?
• Does the title of the poster accurately reflect the subject displayed?
• Is it clear what the entrants contribution is to the subject displayed on the poster?

Criteria for Open Competition Entries:

• Is the subject displayed intellectually complex?
• Is the method of conveying the subject matter technically complex?
•  Does the entry have aesthetic appeal?
•  Does the title of the submission accurately reflect the entry?
•  Is the purpose of the entry clear?
•  How well does the entry fit its desired purpose, e.g. if intended for teaching- how useful is
  the resource as a teaching aid?
•  Is it clear what the entrants contribution is to the subject displayed?