PhD student members are invited to share their work with the broader ALAA community through our 2026 ALAA 3 minute thesis (3MT®) competition. The 3MT competition challenges students to explain their thesis to a non-specialist audience in no more than 180 seconds using only ONE Powerpoint slide. Applicants will initially enter a video of their presentation, and finalists will then be invited to present live at a Zoom final open to members of the public on Friday 9 October at 3pm (AEDST).
The winners' presentations will be available on the ALAA YouTube channel and shared across ALAA social media. This competition offers a fantastic opportunity for students to showcase their work to fellow students and researchers of applied linguistics in Australia and beyond.
Eligibility:
In order to enter the competition, students must be:
- Current ALAA members, and
- enrolled in a Higher Degree Research program at an Australian University on 1st July 2026.
HDR degrees typically include PhD and Masters by 100% research. We would expect the thesis to engage with topics in applied linguistics, broadly defined. Students whose thesis sits primarily in another area (e.g. education; descriptive linguistics; sociology), but who can clearly demonstrate the relevance of their work to an applied linguistics audience, are also most welcome to enter.
Judging process:
Presentations will be judged by a panel chosen by the ALAA executive according to the criteria outlined here.
Prize:
The top three winners will receive a certificate along with the following prize money:
$300 for the overall winner; $200 for the first runner-up, and $100 for the second runner-up.
Entry process:
Students are to record a video of their presentation and follow the online application form's instruction by 7 September. Finalists will also need to be available to give a live presentation (via videoconference) of their talk on Friday 9 October.
Important Dates:
Video presentation to submit 7 September 2026 (update: the submission date has now been extended to 15 September)
Notification of finalist 21 September 2026
Final round of competition 9 October 2026
For any questions, please contact info@alaa.net.au or Helena.Sit@newcastle.edu.au
Previous winners:
2025:
1st: Nissa Mukti, (the University of Queensland). Investigating Teachers' Agency in the Application of Task-Based Language Teaching in Indonesian Universities (Agency in Action: Teaching English Beyond the Limit)
2nd: Keith Cheng Lin, (the University of Sydney). The Development of TESOL Postgraduate Students’ Knowledge and Beliefs of Translanguaging through a Professional Development Program
3rd (tie): Nurlaily Nurlaily, (Monash University). Investigating the perspectives of students in an English for specific purposes course at an Indonesian university: A Q methodology study
2024:
1st: Tazin Abdullah, (Macquarie University). Observe overall cleanliness and sound mannerisms at all times!” – Regulating Australian Muslims in mosques and Islamic prayer spaces
2nd: Junzhe Li (The University of Sydney). Motivational Dispositions and Emotional Experiences of Chinese as a Second Language Learners
3rd (tie)): Mobina Sahraee Juybari (Monash University). Conceptualising culture in Spanish/Latin American and Chinese language programs in an Australian university
3rd (tie): Naomi Fillmore (University of Queensland). (Re)imagining linguistically sustaining early education in Queensland
2023:
1st: Ruri Ueda (ANU) Does oral repetition help the phonetic acquisition of a foreign language?
2nd: Edoardo Brunetti (RMIT) Empowering the voices of France’s regional language communities
3rd (tie): Amani Alshomrani (Monash University) Development of Teacher Professional Identity & Agency: An Ethnographic Study of a Saudi English Language Institute
3rd (tie): Fadhilah Fadhilah (University of Newcastle) An Analysis of L1 and L2 Interference in Indonesian L3 English Writing
2022:
1st: Alena Kazmaly (Griffith University) 'Can language really shape your personality?'
2nd: Louisa Field (The University of Sydney) 'Decisions, decisions: How can we get more Australian students to choose languages?'
3rd: Sixuan Wang (UNSW) 'Indigenous Languages: To die, to sleep, is that all?
2021:
1st: Bosheng Jing (UNSW) 'Long-term impacts of a Personalised English Language Enhancement (PELE) Course'
2nd: Putri Gayatri (Newcastle) 'Blended Learning Model for EFL Teaching in Indonesian Higher Education'
3rd: Van Tuyen Nguyen (Newcastle) 'An Exploration of Developing ICT-related Pedagogical Strategies in the Professional Development of EFL Teachers in Vietnam'
2020:
1st: Bianca Mister (University of Wollongong) 'From potential use to actual use: Helping ESL learners activate oral productive vocabulary'
2nd: Suzanne Grasso (Monash University) 'Multilingual advocacy at the Maternal and Child Health Service'
3rd: Boya Zhang (University of Queensland) 'A longitudinal project of collaborative writing: EFL learners’ socioemotional relationships '