At the 2002 meeting at South Padre Island, the SCSECS executive board initiated a new annual conference award, the coveted SCSECS Presidential Prize. The prize is awarded to the author of the best conference paper in any and all categories.

The winner of this prize receives something better than mere money: publication of an enhanced version of the winning paper in the next available volume of 1650-1850: Ideas, Aesthetics, and Inquiries in the Early Modern Era, the award-winning annual journal edited by SCSECS Past President Kevin L. Cope.

Unlike a few coins in the pocket, the SCSECS Presidential Prize is a treasure for life, in that it persists in the curriculum vitae and influences the development of a professional life from the intellectual cradle to the intellectual grave. Be sure to submit your paper immediately after the annual meeting!

Several Noel Foundation Fellowships, awarded by the James Smith Noel Foundation of Shreveport, Louisiana, have been presented to members of the South Central Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies since the very first fellowships were given out in 1998. The results were so fruitful, at past SCSECS conferences we've featured special panels to showcase our members' findings.

Fellowships include a $500 travel stipend and star treatment at the Noel Collection, a unique collection of rare printed materials from the fifteenth to the twentieth centuries.

For information about award eligibility and application procedures, please visit the Noel Collection web site.