Zhenhua Chen, a Ph.D. candidate in the School of Public Policy at George MasonUniversity, was selected as the winner of the Fourteenth Annual Benjamin H. Stevens Graduate Fellowship in Regional Science. The Fellowship will provide one-year stipend of $30,000 to support Chen in his research entitled, Transportation and Regional Output in the Northeast Megaregion: A Spatial Econometric Computable General Equilibrium Assessment. Chen’s research seeks to contribute new ideas for infrastructure impact analysis by developing a CGE model with an integration of spatial econometric techniques to solve for spatial dependence. Chen’s approach is expected to be very robust since the parameters of factor substitution elasticity are exogenously estimated and the issue of spatial dependence is adequately controlled. The results of the CGE simulation are expected to be much closer to reality than by traditional methods. His research is supervised by Professor Kingsley Haynes of the School of Public Policy at George Mason University.

 The Fellowship is awarded in memory of Dr. Benjamin H. Stevens, an intellectual leader whose selfless devotion to graduate students as teacher, advisor, mentor, and friend continues to have a profound impact on the field of regional science. Fundraising efforts to increase the Fellowship’s endowment are ongoing. Donations should be sent to: The Stevens Fellowship Fund, First Financial Bank, 1205 S. Neil Street, Champaign, IL 61820 USA. Checks should be drawn to The Stevens Fellowship Fund. Donations may also be made by credit card through the NARSC website at  http://www.narsc.org/newsite/donations2.php.

The 2013-14 Stevens Fellowship competition was judged by a Selection Committee composed of: Antonio Páez, Geography and Earth Sciences, McMaster University, chair; Lawrence Brown, Geography, Ohio State University;Tony Grubesic, Information Science and Technology, Drexel University; Nathaniel Baum-Snow, Economics, Brown University; and Laurie Schintler, Public Policy, George Mason University. The Stevens Fellowship Committee administrates the Stevens Fellowship Fund on behalf of the North American Regional Science Council; its members are: Ronald Miller, Chair; David Boyce, Secretary; Michael Lahr, Treasurer; Janet Kohlhase; and Neil Reid, Executive Director of NARSC.

The Committee thanks the 18 students who entered the competition this year, as well as their thesis supervisors. Faculty at all North American Ph.D. programs related to the interdisciplinary field of Regional Science are urged to encourage their best students to apply for the Fifteenth Annual Stevens Graduate Regional Science Fellowship. The winning student’s thesis research in the field of Regional Science will be supported during the 2014-2015 year with a one-year stipend of $30,000. The application deadline is February 15, 2014. Full submission guidelines will be posted at  http://www.narsc.org/bapp.html 

June 10, 2013