IVSS Badges

Reports submitted to the International Virtual Science Symposium (IVSS) are reviewed by a team of judges. After reviewing a project, IVSS judges evaluate each report by awarding the project either a one, two, three or four-star student research badge. Judges may also award optional, theme-specific badges to students if their reports meet the given criteria.

Reports that meet an established threshold—in most years, a four-star research badge and at least two optional badges—are eligible for a random drawing to receive a stipend or other award.

Below are the badges that are available for the 2025 Symposium.
 

Badge for All IVSS Projects

 I AM A STUDENT RESEARCHER

All students who submit a report to the IVSS receive an "I am a Student Researcher" badge. As such, students can earn up to four badges total.

• Provide data tables that contain all data retrieved from the GLOBE Database and any student collected data. Raw data (all data retrieved from the GLOBE Database prior to any cleaning of the data) should be included as a separate page labeled “Appendix” for review.
• Data tables should be organized, labeled with headings/titles/units, and clearly communicate the data collected as part of the project.

• Graphs are present, correctly constructed, and appropriate to the type of data collected.
• Appropriate statistical/mathematical analysis is provided and carried out correctly.
• Results of statistical/mathematical analysis are clearly communicated. This can also be displayed in the form of a clearly labeled table.
• Where appropriate, qualitative data and observations are complete and thorough.

• A narrative describing the data and analysis should be included. All claims based on the data should be referenced to the data included in the project.
• Summarize trends observed in the data and discuss any statistical analysis and tests that were conducted.
• Compare your results with published and/or expected results.
• Discuss any problem areas of the data presented, and discuss how the issues surrounding the data could be addressed.
• Include proposals for future research.

I AM AN EARTH SYSTEM SCIENTIST

The report includes in-depth analysis of students' own data as well as other data sources. Students discuss limitations of these data, make inferences about past, present or future events, or use data to answer questions or solve problems in the represented system. Consider data from other schools or data available from other databases. 

I AM A COLLABORATOR

All team members are listed including students from the same school or schools from around the world, along with clearly defined roles, how these roles support one another, and descriptions of each student's contribution. The descriptions clearly indicate the advantages of the collaboration. If the students collaborated with students from another school, describe how working with other schools improved the research. 

I WORK WITH A STEM PROFESSIONAL

The report clearly describes collaboration with a STEM professional that enhanced the research methods, contributed to improved precision and supported more sophisticated analyses and interpretations of results.  

I AM AN ENGINEER

The report uses student-generated sources of evidence to describe an engineering problem, looks at solutions through engineering or optimizes a design to address a real-world problem, and describes the potential impact of the engineering principles on the environment.

I AM A STEM STORYTELLER

The report describes or shows how the students shared the story of their research in a creative way. This could be through a dramatic interpretation, a blog, Instagram post, artist rendering or any other way to creatively share what the students learned.