When we completed a follow up survey for the past five years of ETD (electronic thesis and dissertation) award winners, we found some amazing success stories including students who were inspired to create and integrate innovative multimedia works into their ETD research components. These former graduate students have now gone on to become professionals who are making a difference in this world. Equally important are the graduate school administrators, librarians and information technology professionals who have worked tirelessly for ETD and open access advocacy on their campuses and regions. The recognition of these achievements through the ETD awards program could not have been possible during the early years without the generosity of Adobe Systems. The NDLTD (Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations) conceived of the awards program to acknowledge the importance of technological innovation, to promote the open exchange of scientific and cultural research information as well as to facilitate the potential for change in scholarly communications.

The following vignettes will highlight some of the gems we discovered over the years. We think the depth of outreach and impact that ETD Awards winners have had across the globe will astonish you. The stories convey powerful and meaningful messages of success with innovative use of technology in electronic theses and dissertations. They also provide supporting evidence of their profound impact technology in graduate education and scholarly communications in the post-graduate experience. You can read the "NDLTD ETD Award Winners 2004 - 2009:  Case Studies in Success" report by clicking on the PDF link below.