Monthly Archives: June 2020

June 2020: Advice for organizers of a SIGCHI Sponsored or co-Sponsored Conference

As I noted in my “Introduction to a series of posts on CHI 2021” post, there are many guidelines, policies, procedures etc. one should be aware when chairing a conference. This relates to the ACM SIGCHI Guide on organising and ACM SIGCHI Sponsored conference. If you come across my blog post via a search I must first strongly remind you the guidelines I’m writing about are for those organising an ACM SIGCHI sponsored or co-sponsored conference not an in-cooperation conference. Second, the guidance I’m referring to is intended to supplement the ACM planning guide with extra links and help on topics such as accessibility. Finally, nothing I state in this blog post should be read as official with respect to ACM or SIGCHI or CHI 2021. The ACM policies are dynamic, so to are SIGCHI’s and everything official for CHI 2021 can be found on the CHI 2021 website. In saying that, I hope you find some of the comments below interesting.

In my experience in June of 2021 the ACM SIGCHI Guide on organising and ACM SIGCHI Sponsored conference are guidelines with over 40 sections. Currently the guidelines are a work in progress and it is meant only to supplement the ACM Conference Planning Guide.

This SIGCHI page is best thought of as a help page which is broken down into five sections related to different phases including, starting out inc. the ACM SIGCHI Statement on Inclusiveness agreed by SIGCHI EC (Nov 17, 2015) and SIGCHI Conference Management Committee (Dec 10, 2015)]. site accessibility, accessibility accommodations, visa/travel concerns, venue size etc. are the first and key steps to being inclusive. Along with advice on diversity and inclusion which notes that SIGCHI conferences are now taking steps to increase the participation and success of underrepresented groups in HCI.

The following sections are on, before preliminary approval, general considerations (including accessibility), planning for the conference and what to consider after the conference is over.

If I try to summarise 40 sections, this blog post might end up as long as the guidelines! To me what is important in this document are the many volunteers who poured countless hours into it to help others. I myself know of dozens who helped since 2015 but the information has been building up for decades.

My top ten “interesting and surprising things” you might not know about include:

information on accessibility, site selection and bidding (some like IUI have calls to host, whereas CHI does not issue calls to host CHI, this will be the subject of an *entire* post in itself around site selection in the future),
information on steering committees and chairs,
Statement on Inclusiveness and how this needs to be inter-woven into everything
advice on websites and social media e.g. did you know that every SIGCHI website should have an /access page which brings up information on accessibility?
information on professional staff i.e. never employ someone without discussing it first with the ACM,
what does delegate expectation mean?,
GDPR issues which can be very tricky to deal with and surprise a lot of volunteers e.g. thinking of handing over mailing lists of email addresses to another volunteer? Talk to your steering committee and the ACM first. Privacy matters.
benefits/constraints of being an ACM conference and likewise the benefits/constraints of being SIGCHI sponsored, e.g. did you know SIGCHI provides access to the QOALA system to help you plan your conference and hence host your mobile program?
Re-publication of work in English did you know that “English is considered the international language of ACM SIGCHI and its journals and conferences”,
when you are planning your conference you should think about Bathrooms at conferences e.g. did you know that many SIGCHI volunteers have developed helpful guidelines on All-gender or gender-inclusive bathrooms

Of course, these guidelines are not complete. For example, the section on the ACM Policy Against Discrimination and Harassment which applies to all ACM-related activities notes that those involved in your conference, symposia, meeting must be trained and made aware of this policy and know how to ACT if something is reported. However, since this section was written SIGCHI has developed the SIGCHI CARES program. As a result, when I as a general chair spot this, I send an email to the ACM SIGCHI Vice President for Conferences and let them know this should be updated. You can do the same, if you see something, scroll to the end and you will find a link so you can send helpful feedback. e.g. “Managed by Conferences”

Future of Work: It’s always breakfast time somewhere on Earth

Panelists: Mashhuda Glencross, Geraldine Fitzpatrick, and Jon Whittle (with moderator Aaron Quigley)

The distribution of the human species across the globe means that today there are people living in every single time zone on Earth. Some of these zones are sparsely populated due to their geographic location within large open ocean areas. Other time zones are densely populated. All areas need the demarcation of time zones to accommodate national and international priorities. Being in the same time zone as an economically powerful economy can have significant advantages for a developing economy. At the same time, governments whose countries span multiple time zones need to think carefully about the associated costs of not having your entire population within a single time zone. This gives rise to unusual choices for people living on the edge who may have extreme sunrise and sunset times – these decisions are needed simply for economic or political reasons. Nonetheless our distribution can be a source of strength and resilience for our species. People in certain geographies with skills and experiences can find themselves acting as social and economic bridges between different regions of the world. Entire businesses operate in certain geographic and temporal regions simply to service the 24 – 7 needs of the consumer globally.

In this talk we meet with a set of academics from the future. 17 hours from the future to be precise if you are living in San Francisco. Or 14 hours in the future if you are in New York or eight hours in the future if you’re in Germany. In this conversation we will discuss the future of work where our global distribution across economically developed and developing economies can be harnessed for our mutual benefit and what the implications are for the future of Human-Computer Interaction and the future of work.

From: http://cs.wellesley.edu/~mobileoffice/conversations/

June 2020: Introduction to a series of posts on CHI 2021

I’m going to write a series of short blog posts and videos about the policies, process, terms, bylaws, best practice guides and procedures relating to organising CHI 2021.

The general chairs sit and report to the CHI Steering Committee(SC) which has 7 Policies and Processes and a set of CHI Steering Committee Terms (with a Core to CHI document) and a set of Members.

Next, the CHI SC report to the SIGCHI Executive Committee (EC) and it has 4 core policies, 9 conference policies, 1 advice guide on organising a conference with links to other guides e.g. videos or all gender bathrooms and links to templates for conference series handbook and conference handbook and it’s all governed by the SIGCHI bylaws.

Above that you have the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM) with 18 ACM Publications policies e.g “ACM Policy on Reviewer Anonymity” or “ACM Policy on Prior Publication and Simultaneous Submissions”, 5 general policies e.g. Travel Policy and Procedure for ACM Volunteers or ACM Privacy Policy (on the right), 3 best practice guides e.g. remote participation (bottom right of link above), guidelines and procedures, 17 ACM bylaws – e.g. ACM Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct and finally the crucially important SIG Conference Planning Guide with 61 sections.

This post is just to signpost you and as I add in new posts in the weeks and months ahead I’ll come back and revise this points with pointers.

Farewell SICSA

SICSA is saying farewell to its Director, Professor Aaron Quigley, University of St Andrews who has been appointed to the position of Head of School of Computing Science and Engineering at the University of New South Wales, Australia.

Aaron has been a huge supporter of the Scottish Informatics & Computing Science Alliance (SICSA)over the years and has been personally involved in the Pool since it commenced. He was one of SICSA’s original academic appointments and has served as the HCI Research Theme Leader, SICSA Deputy Director and Director of Knowledge Exchange and since July 2019 the SICSA Director. Speaking of SICSA Aaron said “Working with colleagues from across Scotland in SICSA has been one of the highlights of my time here. Our research themes and national activities have afforded myself and my colleagues an exceptional research environment. Access to resources and expertise across SICSA has given me a new perspective on how computing and informatics is reshaping the reality of life and how we tackle problems.

I will be forever grateful for the support I received and the access to the world leading talent here”

Whilst in his role at Director of Knowledge Exchange he led the establishment of The Data Lab Innovation Centre. Gillian Docherty OBE, CEO of The Data Lab said “Aaron has brought great energy to the role of SICSA Director to drive collaboration across the members and partner organisations. His focus and drive have ensured SICSA are in a great position of leading into this next period of the Research Pool Strategy and Direction.

Aaron also made a significant personal and professional investment in the creation and ongoing support of The Data Lab, a huge advocate of the importance of data to Scotland’s strength and opportunity. He is a great loss for SICSA and Scotland, but we wish him all the very best for his new role and Australia is not that far away”Polly Purvis, OBE, Former Chief Executive of ScotlandIS said “It’s been a pleasure working with Aaron over the last ten years, through his involvement with SICSA, the Aspekt project, the DataLab and as a member of the ScotlandIS board. He’s a dedicated, energetic and very connected member of the academic community both here and internationally, and has worked closely with industry, helping drive the adoption of innovation. He’s also a great champion to have on your team and has always been generous in sharing his insights and knowledge and hugely supportive of his students and colleagues.
I shall miss him tremendously but wish him all the very best in his new role”

Aaron will be a huge loss to SICSA and Scotland, but we warmly congratulate him on his new position of Head of School at the UNSW and wish him the very best of luck in this new venture.

from https://www.sicsa.ac.uk/news/farewell-to-our-director-professor-aaron-quigley/