International Society for Environmental Epidemiology

The International Society of Environmental Epidemiology (ISEE) Ethics and Philosophy Committee announces a call for an environmental ethics essay contest for graduate students and early career researchers (< 5 years of terminal degree) throughout the world. The ISEE ethics and philosophy “committee aims to strengthen and promote ethics and philosophy in environmental epidemiology.” (https://iseepi.org/ethics_and_philosophy_committe.php).

For your essay, draw example(s) from your academic training or your own personal research and/or life experiences to address the importance of the ethical deliberation in addressing one of the following:

Describe an environmental health problem where it would be important for an epidemiologist to consider the ethical implications when studying as an epidemiologist.
Explain who has the ethical responsibility to promote sustainable climate actions.
Describe how to weigh the ethical implications of environmental impact on population migration and disruption.

We strongly encourage you to read the ISEE Ethics Guidelines for Environmental Epidemiologists (2023) as a point of reference. The ISEE Ethics Guidelines for Environmental Epidemiologists (2023) is available here: https://www.iseepi.org/docs/ISEE_Ethics_Guidelines_Adopted_17_Sept_2023.pdf.

Essay Requirements:

Written in English
No more than 1,000 words, excluding references; minimum font size = 11 (Times New Roman or Arial), with margins no narrower than 1-inch all sides
Submitted as a word document
Uphold the values of academic integrity (no plagiarism or copying)
Essays should be original work and not previously published
All citation styles are welcome but must contain correct consistent citations throughout the document
Submitted online via this form by June 11, 2026, 11:59pm CDT, USA

Essay Review Process:
The essay contest is organized by the ISEE Ethics and Philosophy Committee. For procedural fairness, the essays will be blinded to the judges who will review the essays based on a rubric, developed by members of the 2026 Essay Committee.

Rubric. Essays will be reviewed for content quality (including scientific accuracy of information), originality and creativity, writing style and clarity, and appropriate and accurate referencing (minimum of three references required).

**Note that essays will be checked for plagiarism. Plagiarism is defined as professing ideas, innovative compositions, scholarly works, etc. as your own that were prepared by someone else. Examples of plagiarism include, but are not limited to, utilizing available scholarly papers or essays that have been written by someone else (ex. Ghostwriter, large language models such as ChatGPT or Grammarly), copying another person’s ideas, and/or failure to cite references used for your work, or using incorrect citations. If we detect that an essay has been written by AI or contains plagiarism (excluding references), the committee will not review it.

Competition Awards:

The top three essays will receive a one year membership to the International Society for Environmental Epidemiology
The top three winners will have the opportunity to consent to showcase their work on the ISEE website

First Name *

Last Name *

Email *

Are you currently a member of ISEE? (membership is not required for submission) *

Yes

Country where you study or work *

Home country *

Indicate which option best describes your current career stage *
Choose 1

If you selected "other" above, please describe.

At what school/university/institution/organization are you studying/working *

What is your primary discipline/field of study/research? (e.g., epidemiology, public health, etc.) *

Upload your essay as a word document. To facilitate an anonymous review, do not include any identifying factors in the document or file name. *

Consent:

By submitting your data you give us your consent to process it in accordance with our Privacy Policy

2026 Ethics Essay