The 17th Congress CNR (http://umh.ieeespain.org/cnr/) for all Spanish IEEE student branches (IEEE SB) was held on 7–9 April 2016 at the Miguel Hernández University, Elche, Spain. The event was supported by the IEEE Spain Section, organized by the IEEE Student Branch located at the same university, and sponsored by industry and institutions located in the regional area. During three days, the congress attracted more than one hundred participants from all IEEE student branches distributed around the country. The event successfully met its main objective, which was to facilitate ample interaction among participants and invited speakers from academia and industry. The program included keynotes given by the Chair of the IEEE Spain Section, experts on emerging trends of optical communications, advanced space propulsion technologies, and IEEE distinguished lecturers on brainmachine interfaces.

The program also included one technical session to promote scientific research as one of the significant missions of IEEE for the advancement of engineering and to foster technological innovation and excellence for the benefit of the community. The talk was scheduled for the last day with the aim of integrating all information received through the Congress. The invited speaker was Prof. Oscar M Bonastre, Chair of Technical Activities (IEEE Spain Section) and Guest Editor of well-recognized IEEE publications including IEEE Communications Magazine and IEEE Transactions on Multimedia, among others. During the presentation, the current and future Ph.D. candidates received essential advice about how scientific research can promote discoveries that would foster innovation and help advance technology for the public good. In addition, the talk covered important issues for Ph.D. candidates such as the critical step in the scientific process dealing with the different categories of publications, depending on the stage of research or the level of information. To conclude, the talk gave examples of how to evaluate the message to be communicated, and essential guidelines to prepare, write, and submit a manuscript for peer review to an IEEE conference, journal, or magazine.