Loye and Alden Miller Research Award

The AOS Miller Award recognizes lifetime achievement in ornithological research. Loye Holmes Miller (1874–1970) began his teaching career in 1904 at the Los Angeles State Normal School (which later became UCLA) and retired in 1943. It was only in the last nine years of his active service that the Ph.D. degree was awarded and, in that time, he had two M.A. and two Ph.D. students.

Alden Holmes Miller (1906–1965), Loye’s son, began his teaching career in 1931 in the Department of Zoology and Museum of Vertebrate Zoology at the University of California, Berkeley and remained on the faculty until his death 34 years later. Miller sponsored 28 Ph.D. students, 26 of them in avian biology. Among their students, those with a Ph.D. in avian biology total 166, and there are at least an additional 40 whose Ph.D. topics were non-avian.

Miller Award Nomination Guidelines

Before submitting a nomination, please review the lists of previous recipients below. In recognition of the large number of ornithologists making outstanding contributions to our science, the AOS Council recommends that the Miller Award not be conferred upon the same individual more than once. However, under exceptional circumstances the Council may consider and approve a nomination to confer a second award to an individual, if the new work to be recognized (1) involves a substantially different problem in ornithology than was recognized by the first award and (2) is of significantly greater quality than the work of other eligible ornithologists who have not yet been recognized with the award. The Miller Award recognizes lifetime achievement in ornithological research; therefore, it is possible to receive a Miller Award and one of the other AOS senior awards in one’s professional lifetime. Note than nominees for the Miller Award need not be members of AOS at the time of their nomination.

Submit a Nomination

Nominations for AOS Senior Professional Awards open in December 2020. The deadline to apply is 31 December 2020, 11:59 p.m. (EST)

Nominations must be submitted through our online Member Portal.

• Clicking “Apply Now” on the page linked above will direct you to a login screen. If you have previously created an account, your Login ID is your email address. After logging in, you will be redirected to the Senior Professional Award nomination page.
• If you have not previously created an account, click Create Account at the lower left to set up your profile.
• You can also navigate to the submission page from the Member Portal homepage under “Open Competitions” in the lower right.

To submit a nomination for the Miller Award, you will need to upload 1) a written summary (no more than 2 pages) describing the nominee’s contributions to ornithology and why they should be recognized with the award, and 2) a current CV of the nominee.

Previous Miller Award Winners