Rules and eligibility for Cooling Prize Entries
Event date: Wednesday 25th February 2026
Event Venue: The Wills Memorial Building, The University of Bristol, Queens Road, Bristol
Hosted by: BGA South West Group
Note that submissions should be via the on-line form on this page.
Key dates
- Competition opens for entries: 1st November 2025
- DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS: Midnight on 5th December 2025
- Blind judging of the shortlisted posters: 15th December 2025 – 15th January 2026
- Finalists announced: 20th January 2026
- Competition day: presentations & winner announcement: 25th February 2026
- BGA Annual Conference: 10th June 2026
- Submission of finalists’ papers: 1st October 2026
Rules and eligibility
The aim of the competition is to encourage early career professionals to present their work. Entrants will prepare a poster using a standard template available from the BGA website (link below) on any topic dealing with the engineering behaviour of the ground, whether it be a description of an industrial design or construction project, development of a new piece of equipment, or research.
The poster must cover the contribution of the entrant to the project/research. Although this is not a pre-requisite, the BGA expects that the work to be presented should not have been previously published or submitted for publication. Equal merit will be given to high quality industrial experience as to state-of-the-art research. The work does not have to be solely that of the entrant, but the entrant’s part should be stated clearly. This must be confirmed in writing at the time of submission.
The competition is open to all Early Career Ground Engineering Professionals under the age of 35 on the closing date of the submission period.
The British Geotechnical Association (BGA) expects that entrants will be either based in the United Kingdom (UK) OR (if based overseas) will be reporting on a project undertaken in the UK within the 12 months prior to the closing date of the submission period.
Entrants must be members of the BGA at the time of submission. If they are not members then they are required to apply for BGA membership, at the relevant grade of membership, by the closing date of thee submission period.
All finalists must be able to attend the Cooling Prize event and present their work in person at the date and event stated above. If successful, the finalists must also be able to attend the BGA Annual Conference (in the June following the Cooling Prize event) to present their work.
The BGA will cover accommodation expenses and cover UK travel expenses in accordance with the BGA Expenses Policy. For overseas applicants, the BGA may cover international travel expenses, subject to a review of the costs. Please contact the BGA for further information if you are an overseas applicant to find out what cover could be provided.
Required submission
Applications must be made via the on-line form by the deadline. In addition to completing the on line application form, applicants must submit the following documents.
- The poster;
- A brief CV (1 side of A4 maximum).
Resources can be downloaded here:
Examples of previous posters of Cooling Prizes entrants
Procedure
The applications are checked for eligibility by the BGA Young Professionals subcommittee Lead who also anonymises the posters which are then examined by a shortlisting panel of BGA members, nominated by the BGA Executive Committee. The panel will select up to 4 posters from finalists who will present their work at the competition at the date and venue stated above.
The candidates will be notified by email whether they have been selected for the final or not. All finalists must be able to attend in person. The BGA expects to notify candidates of the results of shortlisting around 4 to 6 weeks in advance the final.
All presentations should be 10 minutes in length using appropriate visual aids for the audience of BGA and Local Association members. A panel of up to four geotechnical professionals will judge the competition. Presentations must keep strictly to time and should emphasise the geotechnical aspects of the work. After each presentation the Chair will allow 5 minutes of discussion in which the judges and audience may question the entrant on their presentation.
After the last finalist’s presentation, the judges will retire to choose the winner, considering the submitted posters, the verbal presentations, and the way they handled questions. During judging, a special lecture will be given by a guest speaker.
When the judges return, their chair will comment briefly on each submission and announce the winner who is presented with a certificate from the BGA. The winner and finalists will also receive additional prizes (see below).
Part of the winner’s prize is sponsorship to attend a Young Geotechnical Engineers’ Conference (YGEC), held either by the European region of the ISSMGE or (quadrennially) in conjunction with an ICSMGE. It should be noted that these conferences require attendees to be aged 35 or under at the time of the Conference. The judges may, at their discretion, recommend a runner-up to be considered for sponsorship to YGEC. Delegates to YGECs must be a BGA member and are required to submit and present a paper.
The winner and runners up of the Cooling Prize are invited to submit their winning poster/presentation as a paper for publication in Ground Engineering magazine. The winning paper will be included in the printed issue, while finalists papers will be hosted online. The BGA will pay the prize money to the winner, once the paper has been submitted for publication, but not later than 1 October in the year of the competition. Otherwise, the prize money cannot be paid to the winner. All finalists will be required to prepare their papers by 1 October in the year of the competition. Papers must not exceed 2000 words, excluding titles, captions, and references, and should be sent via email to the Ground Engineering editor and the BGA Young Professionals subcommittee Lead.
After the competition the finalists are invited to join the judges and BGA members for dinner as guests of the BGA.
Judging Criteria
The criteria on which posters are judged originate from Dr Leonard Cooling and are as follows:
Content
- Importance of problem and technical substance
- Grasp of subject and aptness of method of approach
- Clarity of presentation of main results/findings
- Details of descriptions relating to ground and groundwater conditions
- Intrinsic merit in stimulating thought
Presentation
- Clarity of delivery
- Aptness of approach and emphasis of findings
- Grasp of subject and skill in summing up
- Confidence and efficiency in dealing with questions
- Audience reaction – interest aroused as evidenced by discussion
Prizes
- Cooling Prize Competition winning certificate and trophy
- £300 prize from the BGA
- BGA sponsorship to a YGEC the year following the competition if eligible**
- Opportunity to present their work and publish their paper at the YGEC
- Opportunity to present their work at the BGA Annual Conference
- Paper published in the printed edition of Ground Engineering Magazine (winner), and hosted on line at the magazine’s website (winner & runner-ups)
- Dinner, publicity and networking opportunities
- Paper added to your list of publications
- The kudos (to be proudly displayed on your CV) of being a Cooling Prize winner or finalist.
Notes
**YGEC conferences require attendees to be aged 35 or under at the time of the Conference (This may also be offered to a runner-up at the discretion of the judges and the BGA committee).
Winners are given (1) to (9)
Runners-up are given (6) to (9).